Millions of middle-class Americans lost their homes in the mortgage crisis. Among them is Joseph Keller, 58, a former social worker in Columbus, Ohio. Five years ago, he and his wife fell 10 months behind in their house payments and received a foreclosure notice from JP Morgan Chase. They packed up their belongings and moved. Two months later the bank changed its mind and decided not to foreclose after all, but Keller never found out. Keller’s not the only one in this situation. Michelle Conlin, a reporter for Reuters, joins Jennifer Granholm in “The War Room” to discuss.

A report by Conlin recently was the basis for a post I wrote called "Foreclosure Horror: The Zombie Title."

No one is keeping track of exactly how many homes out there that owners have abandoned, thinking that the banks have auctioned them off after receiving the foreclosure notice, and in many cases being locked out of the homes. But just as probably all of us know of someone who lost their home to foreclosure during the economic crisis, we'll soon likely know of someone being stalked by a zombie foreclosure.

If there's one way to unite the 99 percent, it’s direct actions aimed at the big banks. People are angry, and it's not hard to see why: Massive bailouts; exorbitant executive salaries; huge bonuses; dishonest and illegal lending practices; fee and rate hikes; all adding to American outrage. "Too Big to Fail" is a moniker that should be applied to the American people, not a financial institution whose collapse threatens the global economy.

One of the keys to the early momentum of the Occupy Movement was the outright anger people have for big banks. For example, the statistics surrounding November 5th Move Your Money Day are amazing. Credit Unions added over 650,000 new members with over $4.5 billion in deposits. There were hundreds of actions across the nation bringing people together to close accounts, and in many cases, close banks for the day. Individuals, small businesses, nonprofits, and more, all came together to fight back against the big banks, and their bottom line.

Direct action against the big banks is not new to the Occupy Movement. In the Bay Area, Occupy Oakland has shut down banks with massive marches roaming around the city shutting down every bank in sight. Occupy SF has marched on, and even occupied a Bank of America, tents and all! Marching on, and closing banks, happens all over the country. Occupy Wall Street has marched on Goldman Sachs on more than one occasion.

One action aimed at big banks happens weekly in San Jose, California. They call it Financial Friday. Members of Occupy San Jose, and the surrounding communities (recently, members of Occupy Oakland have joined in), rally together to shut down banks in downtown. Sometimes all it takes is one person to shut down a bank. The surrounding community “shows mad love," as one local protester shared on twitter, and why wouldn’t they? There's no love lost between the 99 percent, and massive financial institutions seemingly bent on the destruction of anyone in the path of their quarterly bottom line. People want to take action, and given the opportunity, they will.

Why not use Financial Fridays to unite this effort around the country? Sporadic actions held all over the country make much bigger waves when united together. A weekly national action can be used as outreach to educate people on the benefits of moving their money, and the terrible practices of their specific bank. But that’s not all, Financial Fridays can be organized around specific foreclosure defense actions. Occupy Oakland is currently helping homeowners in foreclosure with groups like ACCE, and Causa Justa (Just Cause). Just this week, Occupy Oakland shut down a local Union Bank in a community wide effort to save the home of 77 year old great grandmother Katie Mitchell. Mrs Katie, as she is known, has been trying to refinance for years while getting the financial runaround from JP Morgan Chase and Union Bank. The direct action forced the branch manager to meet with Mrs Katie and review her case. Helping families like Mrs Katie’s is one of the surest ways to unite communities and recapture momentum.

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Wall Street bankers and other financial and corporate "fat cats" are beginning to feel picked on and lonely, and they're not going to take it anymore. However, they may be hanging themselves with their own quotes that shall live forever in infamy.

Jamie Dimon, CEO of JPMorgan Chase & Co., and the "highest-paid chief executive officer among the heads of the six biggest U.S. banks," joined hedge fund manager John Paulson, and Home Depot Inc. co-founder Bernard Marcus, and other sad and lonely billionaires in using speeches, open letters and television appearances to defend themselves - the richest 1 percent of the population - targeted by Occupy Wall Street demonstrators across the nation.

If these guys aren't feeling the love now, just wait until what they're saying in their pity-the-poor-billionaires public relations blitz reaches the majority of the 99 percent. The billionaires are letting go with their repressed inner selves, and if you thought this was a cold, soulless group before they wanted you to like them, just wait until you listen to the video and read this evil crap.

Bloomberg:

If successful businesspeople don’t go public to share their stories and talk about their troubles, “they deserve what they’re going to get,” said Marcus, 82, a founding member of Job Creators Alliance, a Dallas-based nonprofit that develops talking points and op-ed pieces aimed at “shaping the national agenda,” according to the group’s website. He said he isn’t worried that speaking out might make him a target of protesters.

"Who gives a crap about some imbecile?” Marcus said. “Are you kidding me?”

...

Asked if he were willing to pay more taxes in a Nov. 30 interview with Bloomberg Television, Blackstone Group LP (BX) CEO Stephen Schwarzman spoke about lower-income U.S. families who pay no income tax.

“You have to have skin in the game,” said Schwarzman, 64. “I’m not saying how much people should do. But we should all be part of the system.”

...

Tom Golisano, billionaire founder of payroll processer Paychex Inc. (PAYX) and a former New York gubernatorial candidate, said in an interview this month that while there are examples of excess, it’s “ridiculous” to blame everyone who is rich.

“If I hear a politician use the term ‘paying your fair share’ one more time, I’m going to vomit,” said Golisano, who turned 70 last month, celebrating the birthday with girlfriend Monica Seles, the former tennis star who won nine Grand Slam singles titles.

...

[Leon] Cooperman, 68, [Omega Advisors Inc. chairman and former CEO of Goldman Sachs Group Inc. (GS)’s money-management unit.] said in an interview that he can’t walk through the dining room of St. Andrews Country Club in Boca Raton, Florida, without being thanked for speaking up. At least four people expressed their gratitude on Dec. 5 while he was eating an egg-white omelet, he said.

“You’ll get more out of me,” the billionaire said, “if you treat me with respect.”

Be sure to read Max Abelson's entire report at Bloomberg here.

Matthew Yglesias:

Next time you read an article about the behavioral response to marginal tax rates on high income earners, I would urge you to refer back to JP Morgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon's fine whine that "most of us wage earners are paying 39.6 percent in taxes and add in another 12 percent in New York state and city taxes and we're paying 50 percent of our income in taxes."

The thing about this is that the actual top marginal income tax rate is 35 percent. The entire debate in congress over taxes is that President Obama wants to restore the top marginal rate to the level that Dimon thinks it already is. Meanwhile, Dimon doesn't even know what tax rate he pays. Just saying.

Dimon should be okay then with the tax rate that he thinks he's already paying, right?