Congratulations to Congressman Barney Frank who has succeeded in finally cracking through the crippling miasma that had smothered the View's will to respond to the liberal mania that has gripped our national government since January 20th. What with the new administration rolling out one hair-brained scheme after another, aided and abetted by the liberal congress with the MSM providing cheerleader services, it's been hard to get out of bed, let alone begin to respond. But good old Barney, he of the Massachusetts 4th, has finally gone over the top, which these days, really takes some effort.
According to my limited recall ability, things began to get particularly dark and ominous when the financial crisis hit last fall, just before the election, when a number of major financial institutions began to teeter and, in some cases, fall, all due to the "sudden" realization that no one really knew what all these these mortgage-backed securities were worth. And since these securities were owned by virtually every bank, pension fund, mutual fund, hedge fund and endowment in the country, we had trouble with a capital T. The clamor of the rush to government bailouts and forced mergers nearly obscured the underlying cause of this failure, namely, the poor credit quality of many of the mortgagees. In an effort to promote home ownership to more Americans, i.e. those unable to satisfy the lending requirements, the government had pushed for a relaxation of those requirements. It had been good old Barney who had called for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to "roll the dice" in the name of affordable housing.
Which brings us around to the letter that Barney, along with Anthony Weiner (D-NY) wrote recently to the heads of Fannie and Freddie seeking to have them relax recently-tightened underwriting standards for condominium buyers. For more details, read the article HERE in the WSJ, but the following excerpt neatly sums it up:
Fannie and Freddie have already lost tens of billions of dollars betting on the mortgage market -- with that bill being handed to taxpayers. They face still more losses going forward, because in the wake of their nationalization last year their new "mission" has become to do whatever it takes to prop up the housing market. The last thing they need is lawmakers like Mr. Frank, who did so much to lay the groundwork for their collapse, telling them to play faster and looser with their lending standards.
Perhaps the reaction to Frank's audacity will spread to others and help us all shed the lethargy and helplessness that seems to be all too prevalent. It sure got our attention.
