Hello, dear Sacramento readers. Yep, I’m on a roll.
I was wondering – with all the action lately, people who may Google Anna Serin (second hit), Aleksey Serin (fifth hit), Kristina Serin (ninth hit), Casey Serin (second hit) or 4932 Dewey Drive (first hit) are going to end up here. And they’ll probably think I’m an asshole.
Suck it, bitch.
I may behave like an asshole. I’m not sure, but, believe it or not, I’m pretty much a normal person – I have a job, I pay my taxes, love my family, play with my puppy, and even now and then, I go to Church. I’m just like any one of you. Yep, scary thought, huh?
Come to think of it, I may be one of you. Or not. It doesn’t matter, really, because I don’t want anybody to ever remember James Marks, the writer (as if that ever was going to happen – I think I can relax about that one). If anyone ever remembers this blog some time in the future, I’d like them to remember that one day, a group of people became so enraged at the rampant behaviour of a Crime Family that someone decided to tell their story to everyone else. Why? I don’t know. To stop their criminal activities? To alert authorities? To let people know who they were dealing with? I just don’t know – sincerely, I don’t. It’s just something I feel I need to do, because I can’t think of anything better to try.
Beware, rant mode is on.
I’m sick and tired of assholes like the Serin Family. Sick of watching them abuse the system like the bunch of ingrate immigrants they are. Sick of them flaunting to everyone who will ever read or listen to their crap about their latest toys. Sick of them trying to make fools of the Sacramento Courthouse. Sick of them attacking what is sacred to us – our institutions, our government, and our neighbourhood. They had the chance to become a part of and prosper in one of the greatest countries on earth. Their son decided to piss on a dollar bill and take a photo of it. It’s beyond disgraceful.
One day, some day, Mommy and Daddy Serin are going to have to face the music. Casey Serin will either face the authorities or the fact that he’s going to live with himself for the rest of his days – and that’s one of the biggest punishments I can think of. Meanwhile, we’ll come out of this economic crisis, we’ll survive and we’ll thrive. We’ll prosper, because that’s what we do. We’ll be able to look back and laugh at ourselves, when we find out we were right all along regarding the fact that living in fear of the banks taking away our home every 30 days is not “winning”, no matter what Casey thinks. It really doesn’t matter how Casey taunts us; how he claims to be “doing his job”. We aren’t losing Casey – it’s you and creeps like George Tran who’ll be the roadkill on the highway of life.
In an alternate universe, I’d wish for Aleksey and Anna Serin to wake up from their self-imposed nightmare and do the right thing in order to save their home, their family, their dignity, and their retirement. Not anymore. I have no respect for those who have shown no love for this country, even after they were accepted as immigrants. I cannot respect people who have shown hate and derision towards the United States of America.
So, who am I? I never really answered that question. Well, I happen to love this quote, so I’ll copy and paste it, like most things I write. Apologies if you hated the movie.
Voilà! In view, a humble vaudevillian veteran cast vicariously as both victim and villain by the vicissitudes of Fate. This visage, no mere veneer of vanity, is a vestige of the vox populi, now vacant, vanished. However, this valorous visitation of a bygone vexation stands vivified and has vowed to vanquish these venal and virulent vermin vanguarding vice and vouchsafing the violently vicious and voracious violation of volition! The only verdict is vengeance; a vendetta held as a votive, not in vain, for the value and veracity of such shall one day vindicate the vigilant and the virtuous. Verily, this vichyssoise of verbiage veers most verbose, so let me simply add that it’s my very good honour to meet you and you may call me “James Marks”
James Marks
….remember the idea, not the man, because a man can fail.
November 23rd, 2010
Sacramento Empire Chronicles 
Comments on: "Who am I? (or “V for Vendetta”, yet again)" (96)
“We aren’t losing Casey – it’s you and creeps like George Tran who’ll be the roadkill on the highway of life.”
Some will march to victory on a road of bones, while others get nailed to the telephone poles along the way. That is how it works.
I’m now a homeless man! Back to the bank I go… the blood bank, that is, to collect $25 for plasma donation so I can afford to eat today! DEE-DUH-DEE!
Anyone know how George got in this mess? His bio used to talk about setting up one of the first internet payment systems and becoming a ‘millionaire’…
Got to do some research on this but George has 3 properties he’s about to lose to Wachovia and one other with a loan from who? WAMU? Thing is, which one is which? I think his own home is one of the Wachovia ones. He had a place in Veneta which he was trying to sell or rent a while back, what happened to that?
All the Wachovia loans are for properties in Utah. He has a Bank of America loan on something in Eugene which could be his own place or the place in Veneta, I guess. More research needed.
What makes you think that immigrants really owe you (or, even worse, your “sacred” institutions) so much gratitude and respect just for being accepted into your stinking country of greedy capitalistic, sexually immoral pigs? I would be happy if Casey beat the system, that’s part of the reason for my sympathy for him. It’s just that he can’t. And hey, why keep all the toys for yourselves? We want some, too, that’s why we are here, not because we like you.
If that bothers you, don’t worry: most immigrants don’t really hate you that much either. They just don’t like your values, or lack thereof, but mind their own business, such as working hard for the Man.
Seriously, M. I was very close to buying you a beer, and now this?
Riddle me this. If immigrants think our country is “stinking”, full of “greedy capitalist, sexually immoral pigs”, why would they ever come here?
Point. Set. Match.
Look, immigrants come for things like a higher standard of living, or their illlusions about that opportunity. They don’t necessarily like you that much. At first, they may not quite realize what they are getting into. I was so happy about immigrating to Canada! Now, I don’t like it and I miss Bucharest, yet I feel stuck where I am. I’m not going to start over somewhere else at 40.
Don’t fool yourselves. We did not really chose to like your values when we immigrated. Some of us, including Casey, were too young to even make a choice. I was somewhere in-between, having immigrated at 18 but still not quite having made the decision myself as much as my parents made it for me. And what’s that notion that we shall have some kind of gratitude for having been accepted? If we were not living where we are, we would just be somewhere else, that’s all. If you move to another city, do you owe that city any particular gratitude? There are universities in Bucharest and I come from a family of professionals, so it’s not even that I got something like the opportunity to get an education or access to more freedom as a woman (if I did get it, I don’t appreciate it, I hate feminism).
I’m speechless. Really. I am.
So many people don’t seem to realise that the reason Western Societies are successful is because of our values and institutions, and nothing else.
Monica, you might not like freedom for women, but the higher productivity that results from it is what pays for the standard of living you enjoy.
Casey’s ignorance is partly down to stupidity but also to the poor values his parents brought over from their failed society.
Their narrow inward looking behaviour, so common to immigrants, has kept them from ever aspiring to anything other than short term trinkets and the trappings of wealth. They don’t read books, banned under the soviet system and now self censored by their ‘church’. They don’t mix with people with any record of achievement, there are no professionals in their social circle, and they can’t cope socially outside the narrow confines of their little community.
This, coupled with their mental deficiencies, makes a good case for deportation.
My parents were professionals. Both of them, as the regime actually pushed women into the workforce. And I am a person who reads a lot but has retained a thick accent after all these years. One more reason not to feel at home. And you see, once upon a time, instead of working for the “standard of living”, all I would have had to do is spread my legs, maybe not even once I popped out a couple of kids and the husband wouldn’t have divorced me. The advantages are very relative at best, and I actually feel shortchanged in many areas. I don’t come from some Romanian village. I come from a very respectable family in Bucharest whereas here, I actually lived in a tiny rat-infested apartment.
Monica, from one Canadian to another . . . don’t let the door hit you on the ass on the way out.
Monica, up your meds, change the batteries in your vibrator and go back to fantasizing about a threesome with Casey and Christina…
What makes you think that immigrants really owe you so much gratitude and respect just for being accepted into your stinking country
Careful now, you filthy Roma gypsy, comments like that will get you shot where you come from. Stay in Canada, please. Thanks. 🙂
Come on, people, a little empathy, please! Do you realize how it feels to live for so many years in a strange place that doesn’t feel like home? Sorry for being so blunt, but it is true that your values and institutions are not among the few things that are all right or seemed that way at first. They are the least of my concerns unless they are somehow in my way and sometimes I just don’t like them. Deep inside, I would like to see Casey sc*** the banks, own many houses and give the system the finger. He would be my hero, and it was my hope for a while that maybe he is indeed that kind of person.
Now, I don’t know about Casey in the States, but what makes you think that he and his family feels any differently about the values and institutions of his new country, or that they should? Maybe there are some immigrants who do just that, but why do you assume that they do, or they should? It just doesn’t make any sense.
You’re dumber than a bag of hair, Monica. Have you learned how to stand on your hind legs yet?
Casey has no car, job, wife, house, apartment, bank account, income, credit, or assets. He’s squatting in foreclosed houses trying to duck process servers because he intentionally tried to defraud lenders of millions of dollars. Yep, he’s really beat the system.
Thanks for the empathy. I appreciate it.
Monica, I refer you to the picture at the top of this post.
I used to be angry about the Serin family. I started with Casey’s saga several years ago when he was just starting IAFF. Back then I was just out of school and starting my career. I was living in a crappy one bedroom apartment, eating Ramen, and trying to find my way. Seeing this clown blow through money while up to his eyeballs in debt and, seemingly, make it out scot-free was infuriating. For a minute I wondered what I was doing wrong. But I kept plugging away. Now, just a few short years later, I live a comfortable life. I have a house, a wife, a cat, no creditors calling, and a very solid career where I’m happy to go to work every day. Sure, I may never reach the “highs” of Casey (both of a financial and medicinal nature), but my n=2 experiment has shown that if you play by the rules and use logic in your life, Good Things (TM) will come.
Even if the Serin family makes it out of this whole mess in one piece, would you really want to trade lives with them? Their lives must be very difficult. Now I’m not sorry for them, not one bit, because it’s all due to them trying to screw the system. The system’s not perfect, but it’s rules are perfectly clear.
I agree somewhat, but given the almost endless stream of frauds and miscellaneous crimes perpetrated by Casey and his parents…
… the fact is that their lives should be a lot worse than they currently are. It’s great that Casey is hiding out from process servers while mooching off his parents, but by the letter of the law he should be serving at least 10 years behind bars right now. As for the parents, they are still living under a roof and working average jobs. If they were working for the private sector, both of them would have been fired for moral turpitude. Anna, in particular, should also be facing bankruptcy fraud charges instead of being given 3rd and 4th chances.
Why do you people care so much about money that you would actually want someone to suffer for it, including by being put in prison? And then you wonder why some immigrants including myself feel at times that you guys are greedy.
I agree their lives should be worse than they are, and in a perfect world it’d be PMITA prison for the whole lot, but how likely is that?
James, I share your outrage at the Serins attempts to scam the system, but I think it’s highly oversimplified to turn it into an “ungrateful immigrant family thumbs their noses at true American values” story. In fact, if you look at Casey’s life so far, the major influences appear to have been Robert Kiyosaki and various other real estate get-rich-quick gurus. Those guys are as American as apple pie. Kiyosaki, for example, is a fourth-generation American, although his ancestors came from Japan. As a group these gurus’ main flaw is that they sell the American dream that anyone can succeed without also emphasizing the need for American virtues like thrift, hard work and respect for the law in the path to success.
I also fault American institutions for letting the Serins get out of control. If Casey had been prosecuted for mortgage fraud in 2007, he would be in prison right now instead of experimenting with mortgage elimination scams. His parents may have been able to stave off bankruptcy. At a minimum their total debt would be less if Casey had been arrested before he had a chance to spend the entire line of corporate credit. And if they ended up in bankruptcy anyway, they probably would actually be following their payment plan rather than following Casey’s advice and using the bankrupcy laws to try to scam a free house.
After the events of the past year, I think the family’s actions are due more to overt stupidity and/or naivete rather than their status as immigrants. I’m becoming increasingly convinced that they just don’t know any better, and don’t fully understand the long term consequences of what they’re doing… I’m not only talking about the real potential for being charged with BK fraud among other things, but also the effects on their future creditworthiness, etc.
You’d think some of their smarter kids (Tim, even XTINA) would attempt to counsel them that what they’re doing is borderline insane, but I guess not. If the parents and all the kids have a scamming mentality, they’re going about their scam in an ass-backwards, absurdly transparent manner. The parents have provably deferred to Casey Serin’s advice in the deed transfer and the BK filings… competent scam artists don’t work like this.
Where they live (California) doesn’t help things either; there’s no way their fraudulent acts would be tolerated so long in non-bubble states.
Then you are a failure. I have moved from one country to another 5 times in my life. The last time, I was around 40 years old. If the right opportunity came up, I would move back to my birth country, but frankly, I haven’t tried hard enough to find the opportunity. I have a friend who left the USA and moved back to Europe recently — he spent many months looking for a job, but now he has a job and is settled back in Europe.
The only thing preventing you from moving back to Bucharest is yourself.
I get attached to material things and would buy things that are exactly the way I want them. I actually spent a lot of money on a mug tree from Europe because the colour I wanted was not available in North-America and ordered some food storage boxes online from the US. I’m not going to start buying a new sofa, various household items, etc. somewhere else when I have accumulated so much debt setting up an apartment and my area in the office just the way I wanted (they are not necessarily great, it’s just that I’m picky, and I do have an expensive executive chair at the office, for example).
The debt is getting paid off and some of it was for other things like my failed “home business” enterprises. It should be over by March or April.
If buying things that you don’t need is more important than moving back “home”, then you don’t really want to move home. Admit this and get on with your life in Canada. Otherwise, if you will bbe debt-free in spring of next year, you should be preparing to move now.
My guess is that you really don’t want to move back, but you won’t admit this to yourself.
If I really wanted to move back to Bucharest, there would be no point in paying back my debt in Canada. From my point of view, that would be a waste of money. If I want the debt paid off, it’s because I have a credit rating to protect in Canada.
I really couldn’t have said it better myself if I tried.
Monica, you seem to imply that you were forced to emigrate from your country. Why didn’t you stay in whatever shithole (metaphorically speaking) you were at? Cuz it sucked, that’s why.
Now, consider the following: the country that took you in provides for roads, health services, some sort of infrastructure, etc. It gives you the tools you need in order to get up and running once again. I bet some people tried to help you when you came in. I’m sure you have used at least a couple of government institutions, and they have helped you.
That’s what I mean when I say you should at least have a shred of respect for whatever country you immigrated to. Because they admitted you in and gave you a chance.
Let me put it another way. Say, you are 40, ugly, fat, unemployed, etc., and some guy who is even uglier than you (but has a shitload of money) wants to marry you. Would you do such a thing, and then complain all day, everyday about what a lousy fuck you married? How you didn’t have any other choice?
Because that’s exactly what you are doing. Do you hate Canada so much? [b]Get the fuck out of there, or get off the grid (cut off any sort of service provided by the government). Stop abusing the services of your host country, if you are so mad at it[/b]. What, you are saying won’t do it? Then you are a hypocrite.
Canada did not even provide the rat-infested apartment where I used to live. What exactly did Canada give me that I should be so grateful for? Things like my studies and my electricity are not free, if that’s what you mean. For my money, I’m working. I did not get any loans and bursaries. I avoid doctors, don’t have kids, don’t drive, etc., so my use of any public services is practically zero. Yet, you forget that whatever I’m using would have been available where I come from. There was running water, electricity, etc., in Bucharest. I’m not coming from the jungle.
If I wasn’t in Canada, I would just be somewhere else, that’s all. Maybe leaving is not worth it, but it’s not as if it’s great here either. I don’t see how being here and not there is such a favour. And what little I have, I worked for it, Canada didn’t give it to me. If anything, Canada should thank me for improving their poor literacy and graduation rates and their famous “bilingualism” (I speak French, too).
I think you need to get laid. Big time.
You’ll get more glances from nice gentlemen if you shed some poundage, you corpulent pig. 😉
The biggest thing that Canada has provided you with is Canadians to live and work among. Canadians are the 6th least corrupt people on earth, Romanians way down at 69th, behind Rwanda. This is why you stay.
You might not directly interact with the institutions which you deride, (police, courts, democratic institutions) but they are enriching you all the same, protecting you from crime the way you would not be protected at home. Ambulance drivers in Canada are unlikely to be drunk on the job, police might occasionally arrest criminals and if you have ever been extorted for a bride by a public official I would be very surprised.
Think of it like a city neighbourhood. When you move across town the most important thing about any part of it is your neighbours. Move to the ghetto get you cheap rent, but your car will be on blocks in the morning, you won’t sleep because jobless drunks will be up all night, and your building will get trashed.
But the poorer area of Montreal where I was living before seemed pretty quiet. I didn’t care much, anyway, as I had no car and I wasn’t home much. And I hate police. They are persecuting the poor and protecting the property of the rich.
Then go back to Bucharest. Leave your tiny rat-infested apartment.
we don’t care about money pe-se, you silly twit. what we DO care about is people who are deadbeats and cheats getting away with their dishonest, unethical behavior. and spare me the moral relativistic bullshit about how it is okay because snowflake is only fucking over “big greedy corporations”, okay?
But the banks are dishonest, so they really deserve it.
Actually, the banks’ dealings with the Serins have been perfectly honest, bordering on being overly trusting of their motives. The Serins asset-stripped the house of its equity through repeated HELOCs and/or re-financings, to the point where they are underwater on the house by roughly $200,000.
In other words, after the bank takes back and re-sells the house, Citibank will ultimately have taken a roughly $200K loss. The only dishonest party here are the Serins — they defaulted on the contract they signed with the bank, they are currently wasting the bank’s time with frivolous BK filings, and they have arguably met the legal definition of bankruptcy fraud. Notwithstanding that “two wrongs don’t make a right”, exactly what did the bank do to them?
There is something seriously wrong with the financial systems and the banks if it is even possible, through various transactions, to lose 200K even after getting the house back. The system is flawed.
Except that *we* end up paying for it, you stupid git. Are you really as fucking stupid and dishonest as you seem to be? Probably yes, since you seem to get your panties wet thinking about Casey, and he wouldn’t know honest if it walked up and bit him on the ass.
It’s because I used to see Casey as a kind of folk hero, like Robin Hood, stealing from the big, bad, rich banks, empowering the working class with the proceeds, and giving the finger to the establishment. I do find him sexy, that’s true.
Very good points, and I agree with all of them. Thanks.
Also, Monica, didn’t you use to promote some pyramid scheme in the IAFF era? The only people that fall for those things are the weakest people in society, be they old, mentally ill (like KC) or just stupid or ignorant. If that was you, you have been far more cruel and greedy than the banks have been.
Which one? I tried several opportunities. If that makes you feel better, overall, I lost money, although that was largely due to Nutronix and marketing Nutronix.
So that’s another thing you have in common with KC, you tried to scam but were victimised instead. No wonder you feel rejected in Montreal.
I wasn’t victimized. It’s just that I had trouble finding people willing to invest in their future rather than saving their money in the immediate term. Nutronix still exists. I just found out that they are marketing some software for learning several languages.
Did you see the people who would rather save up than buy into your scam later on and tell them how stupid they had been for not ‘investing in their futures’? They could be living in a rat infested apartment too, if only they had listened…
That’s a good example of the neighbourhood effect I referred to earlier.
If you mainly have productive, high human capital neighbours, each extra interaction you have with them makes you better off. Maybe you stop for a chat and it brightens your day, maybe you get some good advice, get help pet sitting or walking kids to school. It’s a virtuous circle.
If people like you and KC were my neighbours, I’d be bothered at home by you trying to sell me a pyramid scam and I’d have to keep a closer eye on your interactions with my elderly relatives. You’d tell my kids not to work at school and that the secrit to getting rich is MLM scams and fraud.
You would get your homes foreclosed on with vagrants living in them, damage my property value and consume city services without paying your property taxes, increasing the load on me. I’d worry about my kids getting hit by your uninsured car.
You being a deadbeat would seriously impact on my quality of life.
“I had trouble finding people willing to invest in their future” is really Monica’s euphemistic way of stating that she had trouble finding greater fools than she was.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greater_fool_theory
She failed, by her own admission, because in fact she was the biggest fool in the Pyramid scheme. The truth hurts.
I hate to break it to you, Monica, but in a free enterprise economy it’s the buyer who decides whether a product is worth buying, not the seller. For you to belittle your potential customers for not being “willing to invest in their future” shows how little you’ve learned while living in Canada. In fact it’s the rule rather than the exception that MLM scams are simply thinly disguised pyramid schemes that rely on recruiting new members to turn a profit rather than selling the junky and/or overpriced merchandise they offer. Take the Nutronix foreign language software you mention. This kind of software is very common and no doubt many of the products are successful and make a profit for their salespeople. The fact that you have a difficult time finding willing buyers simply means that the Nutronix software is either not as good or much more expensive than its competition.
But I’m no longer selling Nutronix products and the software was only announced today. I only found out because I’m still on their mailing list.
It was never about money, it was always about morals, ethics, and principles. And greed.
If you pay taxes and don’t use Canada’s services, then it’s your problem, not Canada. You have a right to demand health care, public services, safety (police and fire departments), etc. I bet you’ve used those.
And I said it before, if you hate Canada so much, why don’t you go back to Bucharest?
I once had a neighbor who every week tried to sell me a fucking Rainbow vacuum cleaner. MLM stuff.
I stayed away from her.
I bet Monica was the same kind of neighbor.
I’m very disappointed. I thought that by being employed while trying to also have some sort of part-time business, I was working hard and doing something that may pay off in the future. I can see that it didn’t pay off, but what disappoints me is that you guys are saying that I was, and perhaps still am, a scammer or some kind of annoying, unethical, stupid person. I didn’t think I was and I didn’t mean that. Ok, verbally annoying, yes. I actually think I stepped over the line a little just today when I talked of immoral pigs. Sorry about that. But a scammer? I didn’t think so.
For the record, it’s after I moved to my better apartment (the one without rats) that I started my “business”. I had been employed (at my real job, not at the pizza place) but out of university for a while by then and I think I had started to miss my busier lifestyle I used to have and to feel unfulfilled in my job, which was no longer brand new, plus my pay seemed to stagnate, so I wanted a way out of that economic trap. But I didn’t mean to be a scammer!
But I didn’t mean to be a scammer!
Spoken like a true Serin. 😀
Monica, when my neighbor was selling me the Rainbow (at $3,000 or so) she was doing it so she could get hers free, and she told me that if I sold 10 of them I’d get mine, too, for free. That’s MLM any way you look at it, and even worse, the fucking thing may not be worth $300. I bet many people have no clue about the real price of that thing, or naively think they are doing a good deed by selling it to their friends.
People who know better stay away from that kind of crap. I got an Electrolux.
Nutronix was openly admitting that their business was based on MLM. I never got the impression that it’s something bad.
Then go “home” to Bucharest and stop bitching about Canada if it sucks so much.
More seriously Monica, what’s annoying about you is that you always seem to have some reason why your life isn’t better, and it’s never about YOU.
7 years ago I had a shitty low paying service sector job and lived in a shitty flea-infested apartment in a neighborhood filled with bums. Today I make six figures and live somewhere far away from the fleas and the transients. I did it by working my ass off, improving my skills, and step by step making my situation better. I didn’t whine or complain or play the blame game.
Stop looking for reasons why your life sucks and spend that time and energy making your life better.
I did. I got a degree and I tried to run my home business after work, which only got me into debt that I’m still paying off.
Same thing happened to me. But now I make hugely more at work than my failed home business. Just move on, there are many more opportunities, some much easier.
here’s a hint – unless you are really good at sales avoid all MLMs. And even if you are good at sales, you’ll make better money doing sales for a real company not an MLM one.
If you want to do a side business as well as your job, play to your strengths. What are you really good at?
If you can’t answer that question, then you need to figure it out before you try any other ventures.
The things I’m good at are what keeps me employed. I wouldn’t want to do the very same thing.
Exactly, you don’t really want to move back. You are not “stuck” in Canada — you choose to live in Canada. Unlike most people you have a choice about the country in which you live. So, you believe that life in Canada is better than it would be in Bucharest. Hence you should admit that the Canadian values you despise provide a better standard of living than you would find in Romania. By not adopting the values from which you benefit, you are being disingenuous about your postion.
All said and done, even though we may not like M’s attitude and opinion, she paid for her education and is working off her Canandian debt. (implicitly paying for public services, even if she doesnt realise). Which is still a hell of a lot more than our snowflake has done.
There’s your problem. The things you’re good at are your marketable skills and you need to play those up. If you’re not good at something you’re not going to be able to make real money doing it. Trying to pursue two different things in the name of variety will only divide your energy and lower your chances of success.
If you have marketable skills but your job isn’t paying enough, get a better one. That may well involve moving to a new city or even country, but since you have few ties to your current location that shouldn’t be an issue.
But I’m not very employable. I was very lucky that a couple of years after I graduated, I found the kind of extremely patient people who would not only tolerate me but actually let me do practically anything I want (other than, of course, not doing the work). Who’s going to need my limited set of skills and also put up with me? And I don’t want to move to another city. I hate change.
I think the discussion was sidetracked by Monica and her endless need to complain about her lack of success to anyone who will listen.
The US is a country of immigrants. Very few can say that their families did not come from another place or places. I am descended from immigrants from at least 5 other places. My parents were the first in their families to graduate from college. Their parents were hardworking people who wanted their children to do better than themselves. That is what most of us know to be the American Dream.
Not what Casey thinks. Nor Monica.
Here is where Casey’s background is different from mine. I really wonder what he thinks. As far as I’m concerned, I actually did worse, not better, than my own parents. Everybody in my family has degrees, so getting one was a matter of economic necessity as well as a social expectation, which I have barely met, having graduated (with a good GPA, it is true) with just a BA in an easier program. It would have been such a shame if the daughter of a PhD and sister of an engineer scrubbed floors or sold pizza her whole life!
I think Casey didn’t have that kind of pressure in his life. I wonder if that’s really such a bad thing. By having lower expectations, he is free to be more content with his lot in life and his new country. Think about it: he enjoyed a carefree existence for years instead of having to worry about his next exam or essay, or about paying bills. Sometimes, I wish I were an illiterate peasant woman with many kids in some village in Romania or Moldova, which wouldn’t have been the case even if I hadn’t immigrated. I picture myself fat (that is, starting younger, as I did get fat in reality), in a house dress and cooking traditional Romanian cabbage rolls (“sarmale”).
If you did worse than your parents, it’s your own fault and nobody elses. It’s not Canada’s fault, it’s possible your parents get some blame but in the end YOU are responsible for what you do with your life.
If all you have to show for your life is a BA and a home in the ghetto, then it’s YOU that needs to look in the mirror and take the blame for your mistakes.
I don’t get it. We were not sufficiently important and well-known to be hated by the population at large in Romania. Some people who were, such as the talented poet Paunescu, who was praising the regime in some of his poems, was attacked on the street around that time but eventually became a politician in Romania AFTER the revolution. I left at 18, so my personal contribution to the wrongs of the regime was minimal. I had not even held a job yet. Some relatives of mine who immigrated actually visited Romania later. So I really don’t understand what you mean.
Monica, you are far better off than Casey. Just stop complaining and you’ll be fine.
Casey has one thing that is really great: a loving family who likes to spend time together and accepts and supports family members who fail. It may not even have very high expectations to begin with.
This is why I keep disagreeing with you. Casey has a family that spends time together, but most families probably do this. Ditto the support. But I see it as this: His parents indulge him as the eldest male. His mum especially can see no wrong in what he does, but the outside world sees a fraudster who has borrowed thousands with no intention of every paying it back. Why does Tim prefer living miles away? Why isn’t Steve married? Where will the money come from to pay for Christina’s college? Do mum and dad realise they will be subsidising Casey for the rest of their lives? How do the rest of the children feel about Casey having thousands after thousands spent on him with no results (no college degree, no standing on his own two feet)? Do the family really believe that he will win some court case and they will get to keep the house?
More proof your troll is showing. Try harder please if you think you can keep up the act.
James, at the close of this holiday weekend, I am thankful for your blog and your humor. 🙂
Thanks, I really appreciate it! 🙂
We need to avoid a false dichotomy around here.
Is Casey a crook who needs punishment? Yes.
Does our government need to cut the bullshit and enforce its laws? Yes.
Is foreclosure, prison, and perhaps a thorough beating justified by karma and an International sense of justice? Yes.
But Monica raises a valid point- if the banks gets back the house, and still loses $200,000, something is seriously fucked up with our system. And I think the majority of us agree on this- lending these crooks HUNDREDS of THOUSANDS of dollars based on an extremely subjective valuation of their property is simply insane.
Casey is a crook. The banks are run by crooks. Our entire fucking system is riddled with crooks right now.
Casey is a microcosm of this macrocosm; Casey, and the crooks like him, are 100% in the wrong, and their actions are indefensible.
However- the crooks ALWAYS act like crooks. Casey is not the first crooked immigrant to come to our area, nor will he be the last. We need significant political, economic and social overhauls if we expect to end this crisis once and for all.
Never forget- BOTH Bush AND Obama signed off on the bailouts of 2008. It’s not about politics, folks. Its about a system that has gone entirely off the fucking rails.
I get it Monica, you are trolling but answer me this:
I agree the system is flawed when a 20 something, unemployed kid can buy 7 homes in a matter of months. Something seems a bit messed up there.
Forget the banks. You keep talking about KC like he’s a folk hero of some sort when he is far from it. Look at the home with the green pool? So basically having that cesspool spawning disease and pestilence that can infect my kids and animals is okay? I lived 2 houses down from a guy like that. He bought the house to flip it. He let it go beyond repair. Mold grew, paint chipped and it brings DOWN my house value. How is this good for me or any of my neighbors?
Since you have no appreciation for hard work let me ask you this: I want to live in safety which is why I choose to live in a specific place. Why is it that one of KC’s homes had squatters? Is this okay?
You talk of living in squalor. Why is this? I worked and saved to live where I live and I can say that it’s not Disneyland in terms of rose gardens and mansions but it’s nice, safe and my neighbors all look out for each other. Why is it you can’t figure out how to escape a ghetto existence? When I was starting out I lived in a ghetto area for a year. Gangs roamed the streets, I heard drug deals in the alley and I dealt with it. Once I got a better job and started moving up I moved away from such areas. You could do it if you wanted but it sounds as if you don’t want to. I bet you are trolling but that’s okay, I like to play along.
Furthermore, you talk about greed and that all of us love money so much yet it’s KC that wants to be some MILLIONAIRE by Xmas without doing anything of value. If anybody is greedy and obsessed it’s your little boyfriend.
You might be happy KC is getting over on the banks, and the evidence points to that not being the case of late, but you can’t be that daft as to not see what havoc he caused in the neighborhood where he more than likely lowered property values due to his greed and laziness.
But I don’t leave in the rat-infested apartment any more or even in the same area, which I’m not even sure you can call the “getto”. I just never made too much money and I was obviously making even less when I was living in the apartment with the rats. Therefore, I don’t care about home values. It serves you right if they come down. And squatters are just poor people. I sympathize with them. As for the pool and the poorly maintained homes, do you think if I owned a home, mine would look any better? My much better apartment is messy enough as it is. Again, it serves you homeowners right if a pool like Casey’s is creating problem for you rich people. As for Casey’s attemps at becoming millionaire by Christmas or flipping homes, he just tried to realize the American dream. Maybe that’s greedy as well but then, he just imitated you greedy people. You have this notion of the American dream and Casey tried it. You can’t say he never did anything to better himself.
As for Casey’s attemps at becoming millionaire by Christmas or flipping homes, he just tried to realize the American dream.
Yeah, unfortunately that’s not a legal defense. “Yes, your honor, I robbed that bank to obtain capital to start my own business!” doesn’t fly in court.
Substitute “felony mortgage fraud” for “bank robbery”, and “buy drugs and overpriced gourmet food”, and you have Casey.
err that second paragraph should read:
Substitute “felony mortgage fraud” for “bank robbery”, and “buy drugs and overpriced gourmet food” for “start my own business”, and you have Casey.
BTW, guys, you’re talking to a troll. This isn’t the “real” Monica.
Why do you say that? I find that funny because I really am the real Monica.
Go away, troll.
time for a short new post, Jimmy… put up something about Gaysey in his tuxedo at Thanksgiving. 😀
Thanks for taking the bait idiot. As an aside, what serves anybody right to have their investment and their neighborhoods destroyed by assholes who don’t care?
Oh well, don’t bother with an answer because I know you are working hard to troll us.
It serves them right because they are rich, or relatively well off. And don’t say that they deserve it because they work hard. Many other people do and still don’t make too much money. If your argument is that they are not exactly rich but just able to secure financing for their home, then they shouldn’t care about home values. They bought the home to live in it, so why care about its value? And hey, Casey secured financing, too, so it’s not as if getting a mortgage makes them particularly deserving in some way. If it happened when mortgages were being extremely easy to get, they may not even be that credit worthy. Even Casey was at the time. Still, they have their own home while other people don’t, so if some poorer people squat in their houses or destroy their home value, that’s fine with me. It’s the have-nots fighting against the haves.
Except the have-nots destroying their house drags down everyone’s property values including mine, you stupid b*tch.
That’s OK, because if you are a homeowner, you are one of the “haves”.
People, People! Do you guys not remember Monica FFS? Why do you keep letting her bait you?
yeah, you’re right. i shouldn’t let her get to me. the fact that i am stupid enough to keep paying the mortgage on my house that is now 25% underwater and can’t sell because of people like casey? yeah, that’s my fault, not his, because “i am a HAVE”.
Relax, it is a good thing if home values are low because more people can afford homes. If they became low enough, maybe you wouldn’t even need a mortgage, although I understand that it may not be as easy as that for those of you who already have one. But then, if it was possible to buy a home with the equivalent of one or two years of salary, maybe you would be able to just save, buy a house out of your savings and forget about your existing mortgage. As for the bank, too bad.
At this point, I think I am going to assume you are trolling, but I will reply to this one last post: no, I can’t just ‘forget about my existing mortgage’. I make too much (according to Obama and company, I am ‘rich’.) If I try to pull a Casey and ‘walk away’ from the house, my paycheck will be garnished, my checking account seized, etc…
If so, that serves you right.
yup, troll for sure. enjoy talking to yourself going forward…