Timeline for the Mortgage Meltdown:
1977: Pres. Jimmy Carter signs the Community
> Reinvestment Act into Law. The law pressured financial
> institutions to extend home loans to those who would
> otherwise not qualify. The Premise: Home ownership would
> improve poor and crime-ridden communities and neighborhoods
> in terms of crime, investment, jobs, etc.
>
> Results: Statistics bear out that it did not help.
>
> How did the government get so deeply involved in the
> housing market? Answer: Bill Clinton wanted it
> that way.
>
> 1992: Republican representative Jim Leach (IO) warned of
> the danger that Fannie and Freddie were changing from being
> agencies of the public at large to money machines for the
> principals and the stockholding few.
>
> 1993: Clinton extensively rewrote Fannie Mae and Freddie
> Mac's rules turning the quasi-private mortgage-funding
> firms into semi-nationalized monopolies dispensing cash and
> loans to large Democratic voting blocks and handing favors,
> jobs and contributions to political allies. This potent mix
> led inevitably to corruption and now the collapse of Freddie
> and Fannie.
>
> 1994: Despite warnings, Clinton unveiled his National
> Home-Ownership Strategy which broadened the CRA in ways
> congress never intended.
>
> 1995: Congress, about to change from a Democrat majority
> to Republican, Clinton orders Robert Rubin's Treasury
> Dept to rewrite the rules. Robt. Rubin's Treasury
> reworked rules, forcing banks to satisfy quotas for
> sub-prime and minority loans to get a satisfactory CRA
> rating. The rating was key to expansion or mergers for
> banks. Loans began to be made on the basis of race and
> little else.
>
> 1997 - 1999: Clinton, bypassing Republicans, enlisted
> Andrew Cuomo, then Secretary of Housing and Urban
> Developement, allowing Freddie and Fannie to get into the
> sub-prime market in a BIG way. Led by Rep. Barney Frank and
> Sen. Chris Dodd, congress doubled down on the risk by easing
> capital limits and allowing them to hold just 2.5% of
> capital to back their investments vs. 10% for banks. Since
> they could borrow at lower rates than banks their
> enterprises boomed.
>
> With incentives in place, banks poured billions in loans
> into poor communities, often 'no doc', 'no
> income', requiring no money down and no verification of
> income. Worse still was the cronyism: Fannie and Freddie
> became home to out-of work-politicians, mostly Clinton
> Democrats. 384 politicians got big campaign donations from
> Fannie and Freddie. Over $200 million had been spent on
> lobbying and political activities. During the 1990's
> Fannie and Freddie enjoyed a subsidy of as musch as $182
> Billion, most of it going to principals and shareholders,
> not poor borrowers as claimed.
>
> Did it work? Minorities made up 49% of the 12.5 million
> new homeowners but many of those loans have gone bad and the
> minority homeownership rates are shrinking fast.
>
> 1999: New Treasury Secretary, Lawrence Summers, became
> alarmed at Fannie and Freddie's excesses. Congress held
> hearings the ensuing year but nothing was done because
> Fannie and Freddie had donated millions to key congressmen
> and radical groups, ensuring no meaningful changes would
> take place. 'We manage our political risk with the same
> intensity that we manage our credit and interest rate
> risks,' Fannie CEO Franklin Raines, a former Clinton
> official and current Barack Obama advisor, bragged to
> investors in 1999.
>
> 2000: Secretary Summers sent Undersecretary Gary
> Gensler to Congress seeking an end to the 'special
> status'. Democrats raised a ruckus as did Fannie and
> Freddie, headed by politically connected CEO's who knew
> how to reward and punish. 'We think that the statements
> evidence a contempt for the nation's housing and
> mortgage markets' Freddie spokesperson Sharon McHale
> said. It was the last chance during the Clinton era for
> reform.
>
> 2001: Republicans try repeatedly to bring fiscal sanity
> to Fannie and Freddie but Democrats blocked any attempt at
> reform; especially Rep. Barney Frank and Sen. Chris Dodd who
> now run key banking committees and were huge beneficiaries
> of campaign contributions from the mortgage giants.
>
> 2003: Bush proposes what the NY Times called 'the
> most significant regulatory overhaul in the housing finance
> industry since the savings and loan crisis a decade
> ago'. Even after discovering a scheme by Fannie and
> Freddie to overstate earnings by $10.6 billion to boost
> their bonuses, the Democrats killed reform.
>
> 2005: Then Fed chairman Alan Greenspan warns Congress:
> 'We are placing the total financial system at
> substantial risk'. Sen. McCain, with two others,
> sponsored a Fannie/Freddie reform bill and said, 'If
> congress does not act, American taxpayers will continue to
> be exposed to the enormous risk that Fannie Mae and Freddie
> Mac pose to the housing market, the overall financial system
> and the economy as a whole'. Sen. Harry Reid accused
> the GOP ;of trying to 'cripple the ability of Fannie and
> Freddie to carry out their mission of expanding
> homeownership' The bill went nowhere.
>
> 2007: By now Fannie and Freddie own or guarantee over
> HALF of the $12 trillion US mortgage market. The mortgage
> giants, whose executive suites were top-heavy with former
> Democratic officials, had been working with Wall St. to
> repackage the bad loans and sell them to investors. As the
> housing market fell in '07, subprime mortgage portfolios
> suffered major losses. The crisis was on, though it was 15
> years in the making.
>
> 2008: McCain has repeatedly called for reforming the
> behemoths, Bush urged reform 17 times. Still the media have
> repeated Democrats' talking points about this being a
> 'Republican' disaster. A few Republicans are
> complicit but Fannie and Freddie were created by Democrats,
> regulated by Democrats, largely run by Democrats and
> protected by Democrats. That's why taxpayers are now
> being asked for $700 billion!!
>
> If you doubt any of this, just click the links below and
> listen to your lawmakers own words. They are condeming!
>
>
> youtube.com
>
> youtube.com
>
>
> youtube.com
>
> Postscript: ACORN is one of the principle beneficiaries
> of Fannie/ Freddie's slush funds. They are currently
> under indictment or investigation in many states. Barack
> Obama served as their legal counsel, defending their
> activities for several years.
>
>
>
> |
