Bail Out My Ass
The stink of this thing is so bad, even the ultra-liberal San
Francisco Chronicle is holding its nose!! The question is why aren't
Dodd, Obama, Kerry, Raines, Schumer, Frank, Gorlick and Reno under
indictment ?
The average American listening to all the news of bank failures, and
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (who?) being taken over by the government,
and now a bail-out of large, privately owned and well known companies,
is at first bewildered, and then angry. The average American should be
furious. I am so mad I can't hardly sleep!
But whom should Americans be furious? That seems to be the big question as political fingers are pointing in every direction. Was it greedy CEO's with their golden parachutes? Was it the Democrats? Was it the Republicans? Was it Wall Street? (Who, exactly IS Wall Street?) The simple answer is that it is all of the above.
Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, Jr., and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke were on Capital Hill taking a verbal beating from some of the very people who should not be asking the questions, but answering them and answering those questions under oath.
Senator Chris Dodd, (D-Conn.) and Congressman Barney Frank, (D-Mass.)
are the first two who should be grilled, not by fellow politicians, but
by an independent and hopefully very clever, angry, and mean attorney
hired by the American people. No one from the present Justice Department
need apply. Both should be asked how much money they have taken from
lobbyists hired by the CEOs of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. Since that is
public record, they should then be asked what Fannie and Freddie got in
return for that money. These two are crooks and need to be taken
out of service and the money returned!
Barney Frank should be questioned about his House Bill, H.R. 3838, that
is clearly designed to keep Fannie and Freddie afloat as long as
possible despite all the signs that there was serious trouble ahead. But
all his bill did was make the hole bigger in the side of the Titanic.
Basically all H. R. 3838 did was: To temporarily increase the portfolio
caps applicable to Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, to provide the necessary
financing to curb foreclosures by facilitating the refinancing of
at-risk sub prime borrowers into safe, affordable loans, and for other
purposes.
Barney Frank and his counterpart in the Senate, Chuck Schumer, (D-N.Y.)
did everything they could to delay and cover-up the outright fraud and
book-cooking that was going on within Freddie and Fannie.
As far back as 2003, Freddie and Fannie were $9 billion dollars in debt
because of bad loans that continued to be accepted on a daily basis.
Pressure from liberals in Congress to continue giving out bad loans was
relentless and for years it continued with CEO's, who happen to be
friends of Dodd, Frank, Schumer, and Clinton, leaving with millions in
their bank accounts as the companies they ran went under.
The truth is that this financial disaster for the American taxpayer
didn't begin under George Bush, or Bill Clinton, or George Herbert
Walker Bush, or Ronald Reagan. It started under Jim my Carter . It
started with the passing of The Community Reinvestment Act in 1977.
Basically, this act pushed local community banks and lenders, to bend
the rules a little and give loans to low-income families. Like many
liberal schemes, it seemed like a good idea at the time. There was a
provision that protected the nervous lender in the clause that stated
that loans should be given in a safe and sound manner. This gave the
bank some leeway and choice in the loans that were given out.
Under Bill Clinton, The Community Reinvestment Act was revised.
Basically, the revision started to put pressure on lenders to take more
financial risks. It was felt that lenders were not being fair to
minorities and the poor who only wanted to share in the American dream
of owning their own home Janet Reno began to outwardly threaten banks
and mortgage lenders with prosecution if home loans were not approved
for those who wanted to purchase homes that, in truth, they could not
afford.
Fearing federal retribution, loans started being approved for people who
had no down-payment, no jobs, no collateral, and absolutely no hope of
ever being able to meet any mortgage payment after the grace period of
low interest ran out.
Then, the greed took over. Banks would bundle up loans, good and bad,
and sell them to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, making all their money up
front for loans they knew would default eventually. As these loans did
default, in larger and larger numbers, even Fannie and Freddie could no
longer stand up under the hemorrhage of money loss. Wall Street panicked
and so did the federal government.
Were there warning signs that a disaster was looming? Of course, there
were. But there was money to be made and politicians and CEOs alike were
not about to give up the gravy train of money being crammed in their
pockets. The CEOs of Freddie and Fannie would hire lobbyists to slip
money into the pockets of Senator Chris Dodd, (D-Conn.), chairman of the
Senate banking committee, who was supposed to be overseeing the banking
industry, to the tune of $133,900 since 1989. Barack Obama was number
two at the trough with over $120,000 which was no small feat since he
has only been in the Senate for three years. Dodd and Obama were closely
followed by the last Democratic nominee, John Kerry, (D-Mass.) and then
Senator Hillary Clinton, (D-N.Y.)
What were these lobbyists buying for the millions they sprinkled around
the Senate and House of Representatives? They were buying a blind eye.
They were buying little or no oversight into the juggernaut that has
finally crashed on the heads of the American taxpayer. CEO's got rich,
politicians got rich and they got votes, being able to tell minorities
and the poor, See what we are doing for you?
For years, the red flags were stuffed under the desk and ignored.
Early in his administration, George Bush sounded an alarm over the small
amount of working capital Fannie and Freddie had on hand. He urged them
to sell more shares to increase their reserve in funding and put them on
more stable ground. He urged them to be more selective in the loans they
bought. This suggestion was declined because the current stockholders
would n ot make as much profit.
Franklin Raines, the Fannie Mae CEO from 1999 to 2004, decided to retire
early, taking millions with him, under a cloud of accusations that he
had cooked the books to make it appear the company was making money
instead of going head-long into debt Another player in this financial
kabuki dance is Jamie Gorelick. That name should ring a bell with every
American. She seems to surface right at the heart of every American
disaster in the last 15 years. Ms. Gorelick was vice-chair of Fannie Mae
from 1997 to 2003. Like all the others, she left with millions in her
pocket while declaring that Fannie Mae is among the handful of
top-quality institutions."
The next year it was found that Fannie was $9 billion dollars in the
red. Oddly, this $9 billion had been overlooked in the books Ms.
Gorelick and Mr. Raines kept.
Lets put Mr. Raines and Ms. Gorelick on the stand. The American people
deserve to hear how much they gave lobbyists to pass on to their friends
in Congress to keep the blinders on. That number is a staggering $16.2
million dollars since 1997. That amount bought very large blinders. And,
it bought time. It bought time for the likes of Raines and Gorelick to
make their millions and bow out before the bottom fell out.
Republican nominee John McCain raised the alarm two years ago but his
plan for more oversight was killed in the Democrat-controlled committee.
Over 20-year span, McCain took $20,000 but this did not stop him from
voicing his concerns. The problem was that Democrats didn't want to hear
about it.
President Bushs warnings were also ignored. Should Bush have done more?
Yes. Unfortunately, Bush was distracted by the 9/11 attack and wars in
Afghanistan and Iraq . So now, nearly every hour Americans watch as a
pompous Chris Dodd or Barney Frank struts to a microphone to declare the
failed economic policies of the Bush administration are responsible for
this mess.
No, Senator, he is not. YOU and your greedy friends are responsible. It
took three decades to reach the point of no return and some were there
with their hands out nearly all of those years.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is launching a full investigation
into all of this. This investigation will abruptly end should Barack
Obama win in November. The last thing Democrats want is the American
people learning how complicit so many of them are in the illegal
practice at Fannie and Freddie that led to the taxpayers bearing the
brunt of the their unbridled greed.
While politicians want oversight over the bail-out, there has been
little outcry for an investigation into how all this evolved.
Its time for Americans to go to their windows and throw them open and
yell, We are mad as hell and we aren't going to take it anymore!
Then, in November, vote the lot of them out of office.