NYT 2003 – Bush tried to stop mortgage crisis
September 21, 2008On September 11, 2003, the New York Times ran a story with the headline:
“New Agency Proposed to Oversee Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae”
The story is amazingly prophetic. Here are the first few paragraphs of the story:
The Bush administration today recommended the most significant regulatory overhaul in the housing finance industry since the savings and loan crisis a decade ago.
Under the plan, disclosed at a Congressional hearing today, a new agency would be created within the Treasury Department to assume supervision of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government-sponsored companies that are the two largest players in the mortgage lending industry.
The new agency would have the authority, which now rests with Congress, to set one of the two capital-reserve requirements for the companies. It would exercise authority over any new lines of business. And it would determine whether the two are adequately managing the risks of their ballooning portfolios.
The plan is an acknowledgment by the administration that oversight of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac — which together have issued more than $1.5 trillion in outstanding debt — is broken. A report by outside investigators in July concluded that Freddie Mac manipulated its accounting to mislead investors, and critics have said Fannie Mae does not adequately hedge against rising interest rates.
The democrats in congress stopped President Bush’s plan for this major overhaul of Feddie and Fannie. Now here we are five years later and because congress choose to do nothing, we are in the middle of this major meltdown. It’s real easy to point a finger at President Bush and use him as a scapegoat, but when we really look at the truth of the matter, we see the finger prints of the democrats all over this mess.
Read More Here
- Democrat Barney Frank’s Fannie and Freddie Muddle
- Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae political donations
- Obama/Biden - $112,000.00 + $500.00
- McCain/Palin - $16,400.00 + $0.00
Yes, of course, the Democrats derailed Bush’s plans to save us from financial collapse. Oh… hang on… Republicans had controlled both houses for 12 years until 2007.
Oh Wait Republicans Had Control of both houses? You liberals amaze me. Republicans needed to get it out of Barney Frank’s committee and he refused to do it. Have you seen the proof on CSPAN video of the hearing to put a stop to what Fannie Mae was doing? Watch in on You Tube and learn something. Franks said there was nothing wrong with Fannie Mae. Meeks said you don’t give a heart patient a bi pass if he don’t need it. Referring to Fannie. Maxine Waters said there was no reason to look into or increase regulations on Fannie Mae. Meeks actually yelled at a Republican for dragging him into this hearing and wasting his time about Fannie Mae’s practices. There are video’s from 2003, 2004 and 2005. One was John McCain trying to look into Fannie Mae’s practices. So unless the bill gets out of a committee and unto the floor for a vote..it doesn’t matter if the Republicans were the majority from 2001 to 2006.
Who has control of congress means nothing. The Democrats got control of congress in 2006 promising to end the Iraq war… how did that work out for them?
Having control of Congress and the Senate means quite a lot in a constitutional democracy. Did they have a civics curriculum at your school?
It means nothing however when you need at least 60 votes to get anything done in the Senate.
And the Republicans did not control congress for 12 straight years.
Err… yes they did.
Republicans won a majority in the Senate in December 1994. There were only 17 days in 2001 and 5 months in 2002 when the Democrats led technically but without a working majority. There was also a majority Democrat leader (from 11-25-02 until 1-3-03) though the Republicans had a majority during that time and house was in recess. The current congress is tied 49-49. Prior to that, there have been Republican majorities since 1995.
Democrats blocked an important bill. This bill would have prevented Fannie and Freddie from buying all these loans. Republicans made two separate bills. . .one in 2003 and one in 2005. McCain co-sponsored the latter one. Every Democrat voted against the bill, both times. Obama just didn’t vote despite his admissions that he realized a problem. Even if you have a majority you need more than half the House or Senate to pass bills. Hence, if you can have a majority and not get your way.
[...] Quote: Originally Posted by Truthmatters This mess was caused by a lack of regulations on the industry. To pretend anything else is stupidity And when Bush tried to push for more regulation, the dems shot it down. NYT 2003 – Bush tried to stop mortgage crisis Elect Jeff [...]
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