Subprime Lender Reduced to Lending to Homeless for Cardboard Box Homes

A major subprime lender, Loans4You, which was not quite major enough to get a bailout from the government like Baer Sterns did, has "found new life" making loans to homeless people for cardboard boxes to sleep in.

"Sure, it doesn't sound so good at first," said company spokesman Joseph R. Canterwaller, "but consider that we are helping the very people affected by the subprime crisis. Many of these folks became homeless as a result of our bad loans, so we feel an obligation to respond to their needs." He also pointed out that many lesser subprime lenders have gone under completely, and that as survivors, the company is "helping to bolster the economy by staying afloat."

"We provide entry-level loans for new box-owners, and our cardboard homes are made from the toughest refrigerator cartons available. We specifically tailor our loans to the needs of our customers, even covering two or three-room shelters," Mr. Canterwaller said.

Answering critics who say such companies make risky loans, the Loans4You spokesman said, "These loans are rock solid. We've done background checks on all our customers, which is something we never did before, as you know. While we know they don't have jobs, we still require that applicants be resourceful, hard workers. Most engage their entire family, from toddlers to spouses, in such gainful employment as dumpster diving, restaurant backdoor begging, street panhandling and the like."

Others in the loan industry see this as a positive development as well. Steven Stackhouse of payday lenders Cash and Carry, Inc. told this reporter, "These loans can be packaged and sold to brokering houses, who package them with other groups of loans, resell them, and so on - creating wealth all along the chain. This could revive the entire economy!" When asked if this wasn't the cause of the crisis in the first place, Stackhouse replied, "Doesn't matter. It's all cyclical. If we can prop up the economy for another ten years, by then who knows what will come along? Perhaps a dotcom boom!"

Prez Shocks World: Does Something Good

After seven long years of total incompetence, President George W. Bush has turned the tables and has been recognized for doing something that was not only not inept, not only was not terrible, but was - contrary to all expectations - actually good. He helped South Africa with the AIDS epidemic in a big way, and that country loves him for it.

As his recent visit showed, South Africa was thrilled to have the president visit, waving American flags that, incredibly, were not burning, or even smoldering. Instead of effigies of the president, he was greeted with African women wearing his visage on the backside of their skirts. According to a source who asked to remain anonymous, the president had a good laugh and whispered that he was amazed didn't even have to ask - as he did in his younger days - to get "young women to sit on my face."

Most of the world, including the international press and leaders from various nations, expressed amazement and sheer wonderment that the president didn't screw anything up in this endeavor.

The liberal organization MoveOn, however, issued a press release that said, in part, "While it is on one hand quite heartening to see the president help with such a grave issue as AIDS, in a way it feels like a slap in the face. Just when the entire world had resigned itself to the fact that the leader of the free world was a bumbling idiot and they would have to wait until 2009 for any kind of relief from his destructive and counter-productive policies on all fronts, he does this. Now he has shown us that he was indeed capable all along, yet just felt like screwing with us. In other words, by this action, George Bush is simply thumbing his nose at the world on his way out of office."

In response, press secretary Dana Perino said that, "The president understands the frustration of ultra-liberal terrorist-lovers like MoveOn, but he is not in office to please them. He has had his priorities throughout the last seven years, and they didn't include appeasement of that organization, nor of any other group, or country for that matter. His priority has been to make the USA safe from any form of terrorist threat or propaganda, and by putting the nation on a footing of fear and hair-trigger paranoia, he has achieved a state of readiness like no other president has ever done. And yes, he does enjoy pissing off liberals by stealing the thunder on one of their pet issues."

Besides MoveOn, a few other organizations were less than pleased with his performance in South Africa. Boynarr Sanyika, an African dance instructor with the dance troupe Djembe-L, based in the U.S., expressed dismay at the president's dance moves while visiting the country. "Why? Why oh why subject a country he's trying so hard to impress to moves like that?" he asked, adding, "We could have taught him a few moves in an hour that would have saved him from months of ridicule on YouTube!"