Reader poll: Richardson's foreclosure -- personal or political?

They're fair game, because she's a public servant, who draws a salary on public funds. We, the taxpayer, pay her paycheck. And I want to know if the paychecks I'm signing are going to trustworthy, honest, and decent people.

Its our right to keep an eye on the politicians, and their finances. Why do you think every president publicizes their tax returns?

Peter,
I'm sure doing this story has come at a cost to you. I want to thank you for standing up and doing the work of the Fourth Estate.
Rep. Richardson is a poster child for much of what's broken in our government and I'm sure she's used her "influence" to try to bury this story. Her protestations alone are worthy of front page coverage, but that might cause us to look more closely at other lawmakers and their personal motivations in attempting to legislate us out of this subprime mess. Heaven forbid!!
Keep up the good work Peter.

She wants to spend my tax money but she can't handle her own?

she is a public figure and they can get any of my personal information if they want it.

Why doesn't Rep. Richardson produce a copy of the "agreement" she reached with the lender? I suspect there isn't one.

This story about Rep. Richardson's financial problems with money, taxes and real estate is extremely important. If she can't manage her own money and real estate, how can she function at the congressional level. How can she understand and support legislation, when she has demonstrated incompenence and a lack of management skills .

She has my sympathies , BUT she doesn't have my vote. It's not too late for her to get her house in order. The faster, the better.

No one made her run for office and this is part of the political package. What is scary is this idiot can't cover her motgages at $170K a year, how the hell can she make decisions involivng trillions. She should resign now.

What I wonder is whether any elder-statesman types in her party have Taken Her Aside, basically telling her she needs to resign and deal with this issue. (Perhaps in return for a guaranteed consultancy job in a political office. Dunno how these things work.)

Because regardless of which party she happens to be in -- and it could happen to either major party -- she is an embarrassment to that party and to her district.

Her resignation wouldn't change the political landscape in any meaningful way, either; I'm sure her specially-elected replacement would be similar in policy views, for hers is not a politically competitive district for the GOP.

Why the F would anybody have ANY sympathy for a person that owned 3 homes?

What are her credit card bills like? Is she current?

Does she have car payments? Is she current?

Has she had any P&C insurance claims in the last year?

She should be flipping burgers instead of trying to flip houses.

How long until she pulls the race card?

Yes, good questions: who is her political mentor / handler and does she still need to tool around town in a town car? If you're defaulting on securitized loans and we're bailing out the securitizers, don't you think you owe it to us to trade the town car in for an old vw bug?

Resign now and dedicate the rest of your life to service for the people you betrayed most directly -- the people in your district.

Very relevant and worthwhile for reporting, for many reasons:
- She has ongoing conflicts of interest voting on housing bailout measures
- Her financial management capabilities have bearing on her ability to judge public financing measures, and how responsible she would be with public money
- If she funded her campaign with money gained from defaulting on contractual obligations, that might be considered profiting from illegal activities
- Her judgment is a primary issue for voters
- Her lying and trying to cover up the issue goes to credibility, responsibility, and ethics

... my opinion.

One other
-Did not pay state property taxes while working as a state assembly women.

Man, I make more than she does and *I* never even considered owning 2+ homes.

Her name is Flipper! Flipper! Flipper!
It's just so en-liiight-ning
To see this poor dear
Defaulted to her ears....

Still want to know where she's living now. And in what.
It better be a milk crate.

Okay, I'll be the lone voice here. We are ready to burn Ms. Richardson at the stake yet our state government blew a huge surplus during the dot com years, takes most of our money and gives it to the illegals and then charges us more (taxes) when they run out, haven't balanced the budget in years, can't pay teachers, are in the process of rigging the system with bogus taxes to get even more money out of you, is full of corruption and nepotism and you guys are going after Rep. Richardson?... I don't get it.

for once i agree with JK, this is such a nonstory. sure, she should come clean, but there are bigger fish to fry.

Pure speculation, but: did she, perhaps, buy those homes to be able to tap their (rising) equity in order to fund her campaigns? And now that she's "in," and the market is declining, she doesn't need this real estate any more?

Another missing piece of the puzzle: even in days of free-for-all lending, how (and why) was she able to get a loan on a third home? Two homes, okay. But a third?

Why just 3 homes? Has anyone taken a look to see if there are more? And what about other types of property?

JK: You can't get genuinely angry with faceless govt. I think. And sadly govt. is increasingly faceless and headless too. I spoke with a friend today who has a macro view of "Homeland Security," and they report that no one really knows what they are supposed to be doing or who is in charge.

I for one am pissed because this is showing us the mindset of at least a subset of the freshman politicians.

We REALLY need to rethink this govt. thing. Libertarians, have your fun while you can.

Past behavior is the best indicator of future behavior. I am sure she will stay in office and when she screws things up in office, her voters will not be able to understand it.

Let's say she was a house flipper, and she did it using campaign money... How many of you contributed to her campaign? My guess would be zero. My second guess would be that those who did wouldn't care. They are numb from being taken advantage of by the "bigger fish" that Milla describes. They don't care what you think, they will re-elect her just to spite all of you calling for her head. Even they are smart enough to realize that this is small potatoes compared to the people that are really ripping them off.

JK: I'll say it again: They won't re-elect her if we take away that opportunity. She's right at the nexus of graft and housing. We probably won't have to do much anyway except grumble in the blogs as she has probably already precluded herself from office, legally speaking.

We're teaching a very bad lesson if we give her a walk. If our country is a garden, and the Dubya administration is a giant aggressive weed right in the middle of it, she's crabgrass. We need a systemic approach.

What time is the martyr-toned press conference announcing resignation?

Of course Milla would call this a "non-story"

Complacency at it's finest!