Robo Signers Revive Memories of Gigantor the Space Age Robot

As a kid I remember one of my favorite cartoons growing up in the 1960's was Gigantor.  Here we are in 2010 and it seems multitudes of people are performing a lot like a control box robot (i.e. Robo-Signers) mindlessly doing whatever task asked of them. In the cartoon, there was a kid with a little box he used to control the robot's actions much like banks have done with their robo-signers.

This amusing video clip brings back memories of my playing in the front yard running around like Gigantor with my arms up in the air singing the theme song. 

Gigantor was created in 1963.  Here's a great site with more clips and info.

Serious s**t's hitting the fan for mortgage banks that used robo signing notaries to rubber stamp and approve foreclosure mortgage documents.  The Huffington Post's come out with an article The Most Shocking Statements from Alleged Foreclosure Robo-Signers.  One notary, Bryan Bly, signed in the capacity of vice president for several companies. He testified he signed an average 5,000 mortgages at Nationwide Title Clearing, for a whopping 50,000-60,000 documents.  

Over two hours of deposition videos disclose how robo signers did their magic with the banks to foreclose on properties.

At 7:29 in the video, Bryan states he took an average of one minute per document he notarized without the borrower's presence which is a violation of the law.

In the article the Huffington Post states "Robo-signing is the latest ugly turn in the ongoing mortgage mess. Banks and loan servicers appear to have illegally processed countless documents in the rush to foreclose. The scandal has spawned a host a host of lawsuits, including a Federal racketeering lawsuit brought against Bank of America and a wave of investigations by 50 state attorneys general." 

Testimony of Crystal Moore:

What did you study [in the one year of college]?"

"Nothin'. It was just the basic."

"General courses?"

"Yeah."

"Do you have any other additional training or education in banking or finance?"

"No."

"Real estate?"

"No."

"Law?"

"No."

In another related story We Were Signing Documents right and Left But I had No Idea What I Was Signing featured on Business Insider, robo signer Tam Doan admitted to CNN Money he had no idea what he was signing.  Doan described the work conditions at BofA compared to other employers:

He said that compared to previous employers, foreclosure administration at Bank of America was "chaotic and stressful" and that he barely had time to read the documents he was signing. He alleges there were too few employees to handle the work, and that those employees received scant training.

It sounds to me like these banks wanted mindless machine work from people who were willing to simply sign their names to any document placed in front of them.  This is an example what happens when people allow corporations to treat them like machines, they start behaving like them.