Sean Hannity, while excoriating Obama over housing crisis, quietly snapped up hundreds of foreclosed properties

Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2018/04/23/sean-hannity-while-excoriatin.html

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Is it possible to be a pacifist and still want desperately to beat the ever-loving shit out of someone? Asking for a friend.

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Greed and hypocrisy, is it any surprise?

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Well, duh!
Anyone got the Businessman/Asshole Venn diagram available?

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I agree with you. There’s really very little more to be said.

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Kushner connection in 3,2, …

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fuck that guy.

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I thought it would be more complicated, but I think you really nailed the important factors.

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I know it’s fun to repeat the cliche that businessmen are bad. But I’ve had to good fortune to work with extremely successful businessmen who were successful because they were kind and generous, demanded high standards of ethics and fairness from themselves and others. You don’t hear about them because news is “if if bleeds, it leads” so only negative of any sort is front and center.

Heck yes, there are seriously scummy business people. We work hard to avoid those people. In turn, customers and suppliers want to work with us, because we are fair and trustworthy. And good businesses network. We send business to each other when we feel a competitor will do a better job.

So call out the bad guys, but give the good guys a break please.

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I dont think #notallbusinesspeople is an especially necessary point worth making.

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can someone explain to me something - why is this behavior considered greedy?

so, I think he is scum and this political crisis we’re in is maddening…BUT, just putting aside all the emotions etc…

if we have a scenario where (1) you disagree with some act of government (perhaps creating the housing crisis), or (2) there’s a random unpredictable crisis that caused housing prices to crash (or, if you remember, stocks of the big banks crashed for a period…like at one point Citibank was valued at $1.50 per share), and, in either case, bad things happen that hurt us all as a society.

(2) the fact remains that houses are cheap and some stocks are cheap, and you have the capital and you buy some for a discount.

(3) society thinks you are a bad person?

I don’t get it…isn’t everything that happens in that scenario the acts of a rational investor? are we saying buying cheap properties and stocks the same as buying from ivory poachers or blood diamonds? If so, perhaps we should change the laws. When they put a temporary ban on shorting the stocks of the big banks, they essentially did just that. and I really hope I don’t get morality lectures without any objective, logical insights based on today’s legal system. I guarantee you I am no slouch compared to anyone in the area but I think saying “just be good” does didley in making any actual changes in the world without thinking through practical considerations and coming up with a rational gameplan.

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i’m reminded of the old saying “you know, for kids,”

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I suggest starting over, right at the headline, and reconsidering the inclusion of the words “while excoriating Obama.”

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yes he was profiting over something he criticizes (it is multiple layers of contradictions, I mean he and Obama both got to the party late in the game anyway…and I don’t really see a causal link in fact even going back to the bushes, necessarily…)…but putting aside all that, consider a different person entirely…is that person bad for buying up cheapened properties.

Sean Hannity is a horrible person in many ways, and there are plenty of good reasons to detest him. This isn’t an example of either.

To be clear: his criticism of the Obama administration was wrong, so that’s such a way and such a reason. But denouncing a sequence of events that culminates in banks evicting homeowners and selling their property is in no way incompatible with buying those properties from the banks.

If Hannity had been on TV saying that private ownership of property is immoral, then it would be hypocritical for him to own it. But he, like most people, believes there should be a market in which real estate changes hands. His criticisms (again, unfair ones that do merit condemnation) related to the relationships between lenders and owners.

Who would you prefer wound up owning the houses? The banks that foreclosed on them? Somebody else who bought from the banks? How is that any better?

This is one of those pieces that makes sense for about three seconds. (“Hannity?! That prick! Why. . . oh, wait.”)

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As usual, I’m not sure how to even broach this subject with the people who love Hannity and Trump, I’m sure they already have their excuses and explanations, and no amount of reasoning will convince them otherwise. It might be interesting if someone who loves Hannity/Trump found out Hannity is the current owner of the house they had taken away from them.

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