Deeds should steer clear of Obama
If Creigh Deeds has any sense, he will distance himself from President Obama's personal extravagance - pronto!
Taxpayer, campaigning is not on your elected employee's job description, yet Obama and his entourage just made two junkets to Alexandria in two days - at your expense.
This hot on the heels of horrendously expensive junkets to western national parks, Martha's Vineyard, a golf course, and Copenhagen. If Deeds is in Obama's camp now, he won't get my vote.
Milt Lindner
Alexandria
Internet is not free for anyone
Re: "How Google, Amazon profit from net neutrality," Oct. 27
Tim Carney incorrectly states that no money is exchanged between content providers and networks. Just like us users, the content providers pay their network provider for the bandwidth they need to serve the content. They do not get free Internet connections any more than we do.
What the telecom networks want is to be able to charge a premium to content providers for each network the data transverses. Using your shipping analogy, this would be like paying the shipping company to deliver your package, then later receiving another bill from the airport the shipping company used.
Gerald Steere
Arlington
Electronic system holds foreclosing lenders accountable
Re: "Bedroom community blues: foreclosure crisis creating suburban slums," Oct. 22
Your Oct. 22 report on mortgage fraud and foreclosed homes underscores the importance of providing government officials with access to mortgage information.
The Mortgage Electronic Registration System (MERS) plays a critical role in helping localities combat the problems associated with vacant homes. This year, at the request of officials from Fairfax County, the Virginia General Assembly required mortgage lenders to notify state officials of residential foreclosures.
With more than 62 million loans registered in its system, MERS is a key component in making sure this new law works. Lenders enter loan data on MERS that include the names of property preservation firms that care for properties in case of vacancy or foreclosure. MERS makes this information available to governments at no cost to taxpayers.
By tracking loans electronically as they move through the mortgage banking system, MERS also helps to fight mortgage fraud by making it harder for "straw buyers" to obtain fraudulent mortgages.
Vacant and foreclosed properties can blight neighborhoods, invite crime and exacerbate deteriorating property values. By using MERS, officials can now hold mortgage servicers accountable and prevent communities from slipping into decline.
Karmela Lejarde
Communications Manager,
MERS
