Letters 07-09-2012

July 8, 2012

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Mortgage scams

Great article on the mortgage loan modification scam involving the now imprisoned Tashia L. Winstanley of Holly, MI (6/25).

I too had an "encounter" with her beginning in December of 2010 when I agreed to pay her $1,700 to represent me in a loan modification process with Bank of America. Unlike some of her other clients who have lost a ton of money, some their homes, my imposing demeanor must have set off an alarm with her and all I lost was the $1,700. I demanded to have ALL of our correspondence in writing, via email or USPS; no telephone calls, thanks.

Anyway, you must be aware of a letter recently sent from Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette’s office: Notice of Victim’s Rights. The State is now charging her with: 1 count of Criminal Enterprises - Conducting 1 count of False Pretenses - $20,000 or more 3 counts of False Pretenses - $1,000 or more but less than $20,000 Obviously Winstanley’s hopes of early release in July are disappearing quickly.

Last December I was awarded a small claims judgment in Oakland County against her so I’m high on the list of would-be "collectors" if it turns out she has some recoverable assets.

In my case, after she was incarcerated last fall, I was referred to the Northwest Michigan Community Action Agency (nonprofit) here in Cadillac and together we have worked out a solution to my modification request with Bank of America. I still have my home. Please keep up the good work.

John E. Wright - Cadillac

James Madison's view

Re: "A birthday present" by Stephen Tuttle.

In the defense of historical accuracy, I am compelled to comment on Mr. Tuttle’s creative manipulation of the founding fathers’ collective intent as they crafted the Declaration of Independence and the United States Constitution. Tuttle, like most liberal pundits, veil their partisan political attacks in colorful patriotic bunting to psychologically prepare their readers for "story time."

Predictably, Tuttle begins his Star Spangled Banner 4th of July tale by gushing about the team work employed by Colonial Americas’ 1% while they created the greatest governing system ever conceived. He then sadly declares: "Today we would accomplish none of it." Yet, unmentioned in his scolding of our current crop of politicians and his hand-wringing assertion " ...they will break a system our ancestors fought and died to create and protect."

James Madison’s Federalist Papers #51 "to the people of the state of New York," explains why we are supposed to have legislative gridlock in Washington D.C.:

"TO WHAT expedient, then, shall we finally resort, for maintaining in practice the necessary partition of power among the several departments, as laid down in the Constitution? The only answer that can be given is... by so contriving the interior structure of the government as that its several constituent parts may, by their mutual relations, be the means of keeping each other in their proper places... But the great security against a gradual concentration of the several powers in the same department, consists in giving to those who administer each department the necessary constitutional means and personal motives to resist encroachments of the others. The provision for defense must in this, as in all other cases, be made commensurate to the danger of attack. Ambition must be made to counteract ambition. The interest of the man must be connected with the constitutional rights of the place... In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself."

The titanic political struggle being waged in Washington right now is exactly the outcome Madison desired. In fact, I imagine, he is looking down upon our nation's capital with a twinkle in his eye and a Cheshire cat smile on his noble lips. So, fear not citizens all is well with our great Republic’s body politic: Ambition is counteracting ambition, and as conceptualized the government's several constituent parts are keeping each other in their proper places and thereby controlling itself.

Steve A. Redder - Petoskey