>>This is also a gamble for the banks, and the reality is that the banks are more clever gamlers than private persons. The net result is that the banks give you a higher rate for fixed rate mortgages since they are forced, by their owners, to earn money. But I guess the free press coverage/advertisements ratio is very different in the US than over here, so we get to hear more from "both sides".
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>On the contrary. Only the concentrated ownership of all media in the hands of a handful of corporations are a guarantee that the press will be free from government influence!

Please listen to what I mean, and not what I say! :-) For one thing we have very strict rules for what you can write in ads. It's also illegal to write ads in a way that they looks like other stories without explicitely making it clear that it's an ad. I have been it the US many times, and the way news are presented and what news are presented is very different here than "over there". It's like "night and day", really.