It makes you wonder why you even bother...

I mean, you sit down with someone, negotiate terms, sign papers, promises are made and vows exchanged, you loan them money...

...and with a wave of the wand the .gov tries to tamper with the sanctity of contract.

I am reading through the relevant section of my copy of the U.S. Owner's Manual, and I'll be damned if I can figure out where this is any of FedGov's business.

The new program is being aimed at homeowners who have steady incomes and relatively clean repayment histories who could afford the lower introductory mortgage rates but cannot afford the higher adjusted rate.

I find my heart surprisingly un-melted. Buying crap you can't afford used to draw societal disapproval, not sympathy. When did "spendthrift" become synonymous with "victim"?

Of course, there's a lot of stuff about this that I don't understand. I saw, for instance, an interview with a family afraid they weren't going to be able to keep up their house payments and talking about how they were going to need help, and my first thought was to be amazed at the background of the photo: "Ditch the two car payments and that ski boat in the driveway and there's you a few payments right there..."