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Politics : Ask Michael Burke -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Knighty Tin who wrote (115944)	9/25/2008 11:10:48 AM
From: longnshort	1 Recommendation Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 132070

NEWS BLACKOUT "Writing in Tuesday's Wall Street Journal and National Review Online, Ethics and Public Policy Center senior fellow Stanley Kurtz traced Barack Obama's partnership with former domestic terrorist William Ayers, when the two collaborated at the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, a charity established to help Chicago's public schools that was commandeered by Ayers to promote his radical agenda," the Media Research Center's Rich Noyes writes at newsbusters.org. "The association between Obama and Ayers has received virtually no attention from the three broadcast networks, with the conspicuous exception of a primary-season debate sponsored by ABC when George Stephanopoulos asked Obama about his relationship with Ayers. Out of 1,365 broadcast evening news stories about Obama prior to the end of the primaries, only two mentioned Ayers - one a brief mention of the debate question on the April 17 'Nightly News,' and the other an April 20 'World News Sunday' story about [John] McCain raising the Ayers issue on 'This Week.' "With just 42 days left until Election Day, the broadcast networks have not presented a single in-depth report on Obama's relationship with Ayers. But Kurtz's review of the documents at the Chicago Annenberg Challenge (CAC) showed the two 'worked as a team to advance the CAC agenda,' which 'flowed from Mr. Ayers' educational philosophy, which called for infusing students and their parents with a radical political commitment, and which downplayed achievement tests in favor of activism.'"

To: Knighty Tin who wrote (115944)	9/25/2008 12:15:48 PM
From: longnshort	1 Recommendation Respond to of 132070

Bill Clinton said this morning that democrats blocked reform of Freddy and Fannie, lololol.

To: Knighty Tin who wrote (115944)	9/25/2008 1:02:00 PM
From: longnshort	1 Recommendation Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 132070

Democrats To Blame for Financial Crisis President Clinton lays blame for economic crisis at the feet of the Democrats. He said in an ABC interview: "CHRIS CUOMO, ABC NEWS: A little surprising for you to hear the Democrats saying, "This came out of nowhere, this is all about the Republicans. We had nothing to do with this." Nancy Pelosi saying it. She signed the '99 Gramm Bill. She knew what was going on with the SEC. They're all sophisticated people. Is that playing politics in this situation? BILL CLINTON: Well, maybe everybody does that a little bit. I think the responsibility the Democrats have may rest more in resisting any efforts by Republicans in the Congress or by me when I was President to put some standards and tighten up a little on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac." scoffery.com

To: Knighty Tin who wrote (115944)	9/25/2008 6:29:47 PM
From: longnshort	2 Recommendations Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 132070

Fannie Mae Eases Credit To Aid Mortgage Lending By STEVEN A. HOLMES Published: September 30, 1999 In a move that could help increase home ownership rates among minorities and low-income consumers, the Fannie Mae Corporation is easing the credit requirements on loans that it will purchase from banks and other lenders. The action, which will begin as a pilot program involving 24 banks in 15 markets -- including the New York metropolitan region -- will encourage those banks to extend home mortgages to individuals whose credit is generally not good enough to qualify for conventional loans. Fannie Mae officials say they hope to make it a nationwide program by next spring. Fannie Mae, the nation's biggest underwriter of home mortgages, has been under increasing pressure from the Clinton Administration to expand mortgage loans among low and moderate income people and felt pressure from stock holders to maintain its phenomenal growth in profits. In addition, banks, thrift institutions and mortgage companies have been pressing Fannie Mae to help them make more loans to so-called subprime borrowers. These borrowers whose incomes, credit ratings and savings are not good enough to qualify for conventional loans, can only get loans from finance companies that charge much higher interest rates -- anywhere from three to four percentage points higher than conventional loans. ''Fannie Mae has expanded home ownership for millions of families in the 1990's by reducing down payment requirements,'' said Franklin D. Raines, Fannie Mae's chairman and chief executive officer. ''Yet there remain too many borrowers whose credit is just a notch below what our underwriting has required who have been relegated to paying significantly higher mortgage rates in the so-called subprime market.'' Demographic information on these borrowers is sketchy. But at least one study indicates that 18 percent of the loans in the subprime market went to black borrowers, compared to 5 per cent of loans in the conventional loan market. In moving, even tentatively, into this new area of lending, Fannie Mae is taking on significantly more risk, which may not pose any difficulties during flush economic times. But the government-subsidized corporation may run into trouble in an economic downturn, prompting a government rescue similar to that of the savings and loan industry in the 1980's. ''From the perspective of many people, including me, this is another thrift industry growing up around us,'' said Peter Wallison a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. ''If they fail, the government will have to step up and bail them out the way it stepped up and bailed out the thrift industry.'' Under Fannie Mae's pilot program, consumers who qualify can secure a mortgage with an interest rate one percentage point above that of a conventional, 30-year fixed rate mortgage of less than $240,000 -- a rate that currently averages about 7.76 per cent. If the borrower makes his or her monthly payments on time for two years, the one percentage point premium is dropped. Fannie Mae, the nation's biggest underwriter of home mortgages, does not lend money directly to consumers. Instead, it purchases loans that banks make on what is called the secondary market. By expanding the type of loans that it will buy, Fannie Mae is hoping to spur banks to make more loans to people with less-than-stellar credit ratings. Fannie Mae officials stress that the new mortgages will be extended to all potential borrowers who can qualify for a mortgage. But they add that the move is intended in part to increase the number of minority and low income home owners who tend to have worse credit ratings than non-Hispanic whites. Home ownership has, in fact, exploded among minorities during the economic boom of the 1990's. The number of mortgages extended to Hispanic applicants jumped by 87.2 per cent from 1993 to 1998, according to Harvard University's Joint Center for Housing Studies. During that same period the number of African Americans who got mortgages to buy a home increased by 71.9 per cent and the number of Asian Americans by 46.3 per cent. query.nytimes.com.