Regardless of what policy eventually takes hold, I think it’s clear that, given expected Washington sloth and an inability for the banks to admit wrongdoing, the outcome of the mortgage mess will take years to come to light. In fact, it’s taken years to bring us to this point. Homeowners and their counsel have been on the front lines of this for up to a decade. Obviously the current publicity might lead to a quicker resolution, but if the banks are gaming out their options, they sure aren’t showing it.

Thomas Cox—whose deposition of GMAC robo-signer Jeffrey Stephan brought fresh scrutiny on the foreclosure process—told me that in Maine, where GMAC has resumed foreclosure sales, the fixed and re-filed documents he’s seeing are “more of the same, cheap stuff.”

“There’s a structural mess in their departments that they’re not fixing,” Cox told me. “[Banks] refuse to organize their servicing departments in a way that would produce accurate results. There’s a foreclosure department that doesn’t talk to the department handling modifications.” [...]

“It’s a structural problem that led to these bad affidavits, because they set it up like an assembly line. They won’t structure a servicing department so that one person is the go-to responsible person for a homeowner’s file.” Cox said. “I’ve seen no evidence yet that they’ve changed that structure.”

If the banks are making an assessment, they probably believe that they’re too big to fail and that government will ride to their rescue. They’ve really only taken the 50 state AG investigation seriously.

Two things we should think about here. One, for the banks: contrary to popular belief, it’s not getting any better for you. From a PR standpoint, maybe the dogs have stopped barking a bit. However, your biggest problem is the judicial system, and there’s plenty of evidence that judges aren’t buying your bullshit anymore.

Shack’s opinion, released by the courts Tuesday, is the most detailed picture yet of the shoddy or fraudulent mortgage paperwork too many of those lenders used.

This is not just a matter of minor technicalities, as the banks and their spin masters want us the believe – the same ones who told us the subprime crisis would blow over.

At the heart of the Drayton case is an Austin, Tex., robo-signer named Erica Johnson-Seck. In July, Johnson-Seck admitted in a Florida deposition in another case that she “executes 750 foreclosure documents a week; without a notary present; does not spend more than 30 seconds signing each document; [and] does not read the documents before signing them,” Schack noted.

Johnson-Seck’s signature appears repeatedly in documents connected to Drayton’s mortgage, and in several other foreclosure cases Schack dismissed in the past three years.

At different times, she signed notarized documents assigning the loan, claiming to be a vice president of MERS (a private financial recording service for major banks), a vice president of INDYMAC, a vice president of Deutsche Bank and a vice president of OneWest.

You have to read the decision for the full effect. As Yves said, the very diligent opinion by Judge Shack in this case provides a roadmap for other judges to follow. Across the country, precedent is being built. And it doesn’t look good for the banks. Furthermore, it doesn’t take every judge in America to make this a miserable proposition for them.

The second point I want to make goes to the policymakers. If they think they can ignore this problem and ever see real economic recovery again, they’re wrong. This analysis from Chris Whalen is very plain-spoken, and all you need to know is this:

Because President Barack Obama and the leaders of both political parties are unwilling to address the housing crisis and the wasting effects on the largest banks, there will be no growth and no net job creation in the U.S. for the next several years. And because the Obama White House is content to ignore the crisis facing millions of American homeowners, who are deep underwater and will eventually default on their loans, the efforts by the Fed to reflate the U.S. economy and particularly consumer spending will be futile.

That’s the bottom line. We have a crisis that we can either deal with or allow to fester. So really, it’s up to the lawmakers. You can throw as many tax breaks at businesses as you want and it won’t move the needle. Politicians can continue their careers, or they can ignore this problem. Not both.