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POPS Thomas Sowell Opines --- Do Facts Matter? So did Bush's Secretary of the Treasury, five years ago. Yet, today, what are we hearing? That it was the Bush administration "right-wing ideology" of "de-regulation" that set the stage for the financial crisis. Do facts matter? We also hear that it is the free market that is to blame. But the facts show that it was the government that pressured financial institutions in general to lend to subprime borrowers, with such things as the Community Reinvestment Act and, later, threats of legal action by then Attorney General Janet Reno if the feds did not like the statistics on who was getting loans and who wasn't. Is that the free market? Or do facts not matter? Then there is the question of being against the "greed" of CEOs and for "the people." Franklin Raines made $90 million while he was head of Fannie Mae and mismanaging that institution into crisis. Who in Congress defended Franklin Raines?
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POPSDo Facts Matter? "We also hear that it is the free market that is to blame. But the facts show that it was the government that pressured financial institutions in general to lend to subprime borrowers, with such things as the Community Reinvestment Act and, later, threats of legal action by then Attorney General Janet Reno if the feds did not like the statistics on who was getting loans and who wasn’t. Is that the free market? Or do facts not matter?"
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POPSNo.1 of the Fannie Five - Chris Dodd The Center for Public Integrity criticized Dodd for “being the leading advocate in the Senate on behalf of the accounting industry.” Political consultant and commentator Dick Morris wrote that Dodd had received more from accounting firm Arthur Andersen than any other Democrat and bore responsibility for trying to shield accounting firms from investor fraud liability in cases such as the Enron scandal. Arthur Anderson was forced to surrender its license to conduct CPA business in the US. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Dodd.
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POPSDemocrat Fingerprints Are All Over The Financial Crisis ........under stricter regulatory control. In 2006, it was revealed that Fannie Mae had overstated its earnings – to which its senior executives' bonuses were linked – by a stunning $9.3billion. Between 1998 and 2003, Fannie Mae's executive chairman, Franklin Raines, picked up over $90m in bonuses and stock options. Yet Barney Frank and his chums blocked all Bush's attempts to put a rein on Raines. During the House Financial Services Committee hearing following Bush's initiative, Frank declared: "The more people exaggerate a threat of safety and soundness , the more people conjure up the possibility of serious financial losses to the Treasury which I do not see. "There were nearly a dozen hearings where we were trying to fix something that wasn't broke. Mr Chairman, we do not have a crisis at Freddie Mac and particularly at Fannie Mae under the outstanding leadership of Mr Franklin Raines."
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POPSThe Financial Crisis And how many politicians have we heard say that this Financial Crisis is Bush's fault. If you repeat a lie often enough, people will begin to believe it. Leave no incumbent in office.
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POPSBill Clinton Agrees That Democrats To Blame For Crisis Sept. 25, 2008, A Day That Will Be Recorded In History: With incentives in place, banks poured billions of dollars of loans into poor communities, often "no doc" and "no income" loans that required no money down and no verification of income. By 2007, Fannie and Freddie owned or guaranteed nearly half of the $12 trillion U.S. mortgage market -- a staggering exposure. Worse still was the cronyism. Fannie and Freddie became home to out-of-work politicians, mostly Clinton Democrats. An informal survey of their top officials shows a roughly 2-to-1 dominance of Democrats over Republicans. Then there were the campaign donations. From 1989 to 2008, some 384 politicians got their tip jars filled by Fannie and Freddie: #1 Senator Dodd #2 Senator Obama
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POPS The Bailout: Will The Center Hold? The bill takes a hybrid approach, and in the case of assets bought at auction, the most severe penalties kick in only when Treasury has bought more than $300 million in assets. At that juncture, a 20 percent surtax would be imposed on rich severance packages, and in the case of highly paid executives, the company would lose its deduction for salaries above $500,000. The second compromise dealt with a Republican proposal that the government intervene in the markets, not by buying up bad assets but by providing a federally backed insurance program that might make the same mortgage-related securities more salable. House GOP leaders had warned Saturday evening that they would need to take any deal to their rank-and-file members before committing to back it. In a sign that negotiations were growing serious earlier in the evening, a Pelosi aide collected BlackBerrys from the staffers meeting in her office so that no details would leak out.
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POPShere's one Gibson: Was the agreement on principles announced by Senator Dodd and Congressman Frank and others this morning -- was that enough for you to sign on, or do you want other changes in this bill?
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POPSObama - a popular Freddie Mac Senator Obama is in the top 4 of political contribution recipients from Freddie Mac. The other 3, also Democrats. Then add Chris Dodd and Barney Frank to the mix and it's very 'clear' how they blame the Bush administration for the debacle.
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POPS20% of Profit from $700 Billion Snafu Pegged for Democrats' Pet PAC! While Democrats are busy waffling between blaming the whole standoff on McCain and claiming that he contributed little to the discussion (Pelosi called his participation a "blip"), these liberals failed to mention Dodd had earmarked 20% of profits from the $700 billion bailout to go to ACORN, a liberal PAC accused of vote fraud! Ask yourself why Pelosi's so hot to push a Bush plan in the first place...
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POPSMcCain's Version of 'Leadership' So basically, he had to rush off to Washington to keep a chair warm. Nice stunt. The piece goes on: Sen. Chris Dodd said, “Instead of being a rescue plan for our economy it was a rescue plan for John McCain .” Sen. Chuck Schumer urged Bush to “respectfully tell Sen. McCain to get out of town. He’s not helping .” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid added, “We had Senator Bennett, a high ranking official, who said these are the principles. And then, guess who came to town? And it all fell apart.” Leadership? I don't think so.
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POPSBailout Progressing This begs the question of what exactly McCain will be doing after he dismounts from his white charger after riding into Washington to save the economy and save the country. Seems like his panicked approach to crisis has pretty much petered out.
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POPSBush and Cronies in US Stock Market A 'stock' be created in a popular 'Market' place with holes to confine ankles and wrists of Bush and his cronies, for victims of their 'Stock Market' shenanigan to have a go to vent their feelings.
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POPSWall Street I want to provide stock research for the little guy, after having witnessed neglect of proper due diligence requirements at my old firm and poor performance among most analysts.
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POPSThe Banking Bailout and Those Bells and Whistles 
It seemed like everyone was on the same page--it lasted for about 24 hours. But the funds are not uncontroversial and have been criticized as a method by which politicians can cater to special interests. The funds were set to receive funding from Fannie Mae (nyse: FNM ) and Freddie Mac (nyse: FRE ) in this summer's Housing Bill. The uncertainty over the funds is tied directly to the uncertainty with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which need new legislation from the next Congress. The Treasury program to buy equity and securities from Fannie and Freddie only lasts through 2009. Under the new proposal, however, the funds will be addressed now. Together they receive one-fifth of the profits from the Treasury's purchasing program. Of that fifth, 65% go to the Housing Trust Fund and 35% to the Capital Magnet Fund. The remainder of the profits would stay with the Treasury. Not exactly the clean and simple passage that everyone was talking about on Sunday morning.
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POPSCROOKS Driving home from a meeting I heard Chris Dood in a news bite, saying something like - "Democrats are not about to sign off on this 700B bailout until we're assured that congress will have oversight." I cursed. "You MFCSMFF! You're a bigger crook than your old man!"
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POPSWho Supported Fannie R E G U L A T I O N ? !! It never made it out of committee. Chris Dodd, then the ranking member of the Banking Committee and now its chair, was in the middle of receiving preferential loan treatment from Countrywide Mortgage, one of the companies gaming the system in the credit crisis. Meanwhile, Barack Obama took hundreds of thousands of dollars from the lobbyists McCain mentions in this speech, making him the #2 recipient of Fannie/Freddie money:
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POPSlawmakers promise fast action on bailout You can expect the bailout to cost many more times than even specified here, You see they have to prevent these falures before the FDIC insurance fund is used up then any new failures will be feed wolves. There saving favorites.
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POPSDemocrats In Congress Eye Emergency Bailout — And More But that’s just a start. • Bankruptcy protection for homeowners. Some Democrats see this bill as a golden opportunity to renew their push.... • Social spending and infrastructure funds. The most liberal Democrats are pushing to have an economic stimulus package — with unemployment extensions, infrastructure spending and aid to states — tacked on to the bill. Democratic aides said that more stringent regulations and perhaps a crackdown on CEO compensation is a longer term discussion that may need to wait. • Foreclosure protection. Dodd was intentionally vague when he insisted on foreclosure protection for homeowners..... Rep. Steve LaTourette (R-Ohio) said, “We have to communicate the fact that if the big guys fail, then your savings, your retirement, your mortgage will be in trouble.” On the opposite end of the spectrum, “It would be a huge problem if the package were used that way ,” Sen. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.) said.
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POPSSunday Clip - Who would I vote for? Ron Paul is leading with Australia at www.whowouldtheworldelect.com statistics below, with 1289 votes.. Check out your own country. See what nuts are not listed on the menu at westernfrontonline.net. I'd never heard of Jack Grimes till today nor United Fascist Union.
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POPSBigPicture=Acorn+Fannie+SubPrimeGoneMad 1993,Congress gave Fannie and Freddie the go-ahead to finance it all by buying loans from banks, then repackaging and securitizing them for resale on the open market. "We have to use every means at our disposal to end discrimination and to end it as quickly as possible," Clinton's comptroller of the currency, Eugene Ludwig, told the Senate Banking Committee in 1993. Wall Street eagerly sold the new mortgage-backed securities. Not only were they pooled investments, mixing good and bad, but they were backed with the implicit guarantee of government.
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POPSSen. Reid said ``no one knows what to do'' ``They already have the authority; it's just a question of moving it up a couple of years,'' House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank, of Massachusetts, told reporters yesterday. ``We're trying to work that out.'' Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd said the Fed also has the power to buy and dispose of bad debt stemming from the subprime-mortgage crisis. ``The Fed has the authority to move in this area,'' Dodd told reporters in Washington. Creating a separate agency to take on bad debt, akin to the Resolution Trust Corp. set up in 1989 to absorb losses from savings-and-loan associations, would take about a year, he said. Instead, the Fed should use its own authority to act. ``The last thing you need,''Sen Isakson R-Ga, said, ``are 535 people, not many of whom are that well-versed in financial markets, trying to do quick fixes to a market correction that's one of the more significant that we've ever seen.''
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POPSDemocrats: Fannie, Freddie And The Housing Crisis and Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae are GSEs. The GSEs give to Democrats primarily. Republicans tried to reform it, but got out lobbied every time. In 2005, Republican Mike Oxley, then chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, brought up a reform bill (H.R. 1461), and Fannie and Freddie's lobbyists set out to weaken it. The bill was rendered so toothless that Card promised to oppose it and Oxley pulled the bill instead. When there was a Republican Congress, Congressional leadership tried to do the right thing, but Fannie and Freddie's lobbyists picked off some weak Republicans. With a Democratic Congress, Fannie and Freddie just feed at the trough. Third, these guys are some of the most powerful figures in the Democratic lobbyist-operative firmament. Obama was forced to fire James Johnson, his first VP Vetter. Johnson had been CEO of Fannie Mae. Johnson, while a consultant for Fannie and Countrywide, was passing out below market loans to Senator Dodd among others.
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