Earlier this month, Bank of America (BOA), the country’s largest bank, announced a moratorium on foreclosures in all 50 states.

There’s a huge buzz out there among homeowner activists who are feeling vindicated for the hard work they’ve done over the past couple of years and in many cases even longer. The recent news inundating the headlines of blatant fraud on the part of lenders and servicers has offered proof that their actions and fight have not been in vain.

Centuries ago, news of momentous events traveled throughout the countryside by means of beacon fires, alerting all along the route to big changes coming. September and October 2010, are shaping up to be the time of the beacon fires when it comes to foreclosure fraud.

Weekend Art: Art of the Economic Collapse: Prophet of Doom vs. Triumph Over the Banking Blues — by NormanB (“Deviations from the Norm”)

Unionized bank workers from Brazil, England, Chile, Germany, and Uruguay are encouraging American workers to undertake an unprecedented campaign against a common enemy: Grupo Santander,

Tomorrow in Phoenix Advocates & Actions will release a report called “Modification Mysteries: Playing Foreclosure Roulette with the Banks.” The report will not only document the huge ineptness of the Treasury Department and the banks in handling foreclosure modifications (as I discussed last week less than $250 million has been spent of the $50 billion TARP money set aside to prevent foreclosures according to testimony by the TARP inspector general to Congress!), but also the total indifference, program misunderstanding, and frankly incompetence of the way the banks have handled homeowners desperate for relief to prevent foreclosures.

Country Wide (or rather, its parent company Bank of America) has to pay an FTC fine for ripping off homeonwers in distress. A fine of only 2 ents per $100 dollars of its enterpise value. Cry me a river.

One in 10 mortgages is delinquent on payments. In other news, Bank of America plans to increase foreclosure rates by 600 percent.

Videos from yesterdays protest on K Street in Washington DC.

The good news on the Senate financial reform bill these days is that we have a few provisions worth fighting for. Senator Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) has introduced [http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d111:SP3739: one of the most important] – a bold section in the Dodd bank reform bill (Section 106) that will force the biggest banks to spin off their swaps (or derivatives) desks into a separate entity. That entity will be regulated and can remain part of the bank holding company, but it no longer has access to the Federal Reserve’s flow of funds, FDIC insurance and the taxpayer guarantee. Help us do w hip count to make sure Lincoln’s language passes.