Byron York has a great primer on this corruption. A good start would be here.
On May 23, 2006, as a jury in Houston deliberated the case against top Enron executives Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling, a little-known regulatory agency in Washington, the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight (OFHEO), released a study with the dryly bureaucratic title “Report of the Special Examination of Fannie Mae.” The document received far less attention than the news from Enron, but its conclusions were stunning. In meticulous detail, it outlined a culture of corruption at the Federal National Mortgage Association — better known as Fannie Mae — that rivals the most serious corporate scandals in recent years. In this case, however, the main players are Washington insiders — some of them prominent veterans of the Clinton administration — and the scandal’s effects could ripple through Congress for years.
Fannie Mae is the biggest single source of money for mortgages in the United States. From 1998 to 2004, the years covered by the OFHEO investigation, it was headed by former Clinton budget director Franklin Raines, whose top management team included former Clinton Justice Department official Jamie Gorelick, sometimes mentioned as a future attorney general in a Democratic administration. During that period, the report says, Raines and his team grossly overstated Fannie Mae’s earnings — to the tune of $10.6 billion — for the purpose of paying themselves big bonuses. “By deliberately and intentionally manipulating accounting to hit earnings targets,” the report says, “senior management maximized the bonuses and other executive compensation they received, at the expense of shareholders.”
Article Here
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To: paul in cape
Come to think of it, maybe we need a pitbull!
To: paul in cape
Obama’s Economic “advisor”, Frankie Raines, needs to go to jail before he can do anymore damage.
3 posted on
09/15/2008 6:41:23 PM PDT by
FlingWingFlyer
("Troopergate" - The Revenge of the Alaskan Good Old Boys Club.)
To: paul in cape
Thanks for putting this back up - Raines walked away with nearly $100 million, and Dodd, Obama were the 2 largest receivers of their political donation largess...
BUT... it all started with Andrew Cuomo, and the redlining ban...
4 posted on
09/15/2008 6:41:52 PM PDT by
xcamel
(Conservatives start smart, and get rich, liberals start rich, and get stupid.)
To: paul in cape
6 posted on
09/15/2008 7:00:23 PM PDT by
NonValueAdded
(don't worry, they only want to take water out of the other guy's side of the bucket.)
To: paul in cape
7 posted on
09/15/2008 7:05:50 PM PDT by
PGalt
To: paul in cape
But in the 1990s, the company moved in a much riskier direction. Fannie Mae used its borrowing power to buy up mortgages and hold them, making a profit from the difference between the low price it paid to borrow the money and the higher interest rate it received on the mortgage. It was potentially profitable, but it had nothing to do with helping low- and middle-income people buy houses
But... but... but... the democrat party is the protector of the poor!
8 posted on
09/15/2008 7:08:13 PM PDT by
snowrip
(Liberal? YOU ARE A SOCIALIST WITH NO RATIONAL ARGUMENT.)
To: paul in cape
Lots of people need to be frog marched off to jail in orange jumpsuits.
Most of Obama’s advisory staff for one thing.
To say nothing of Jamie Gorelick needing serious jail time.
9 posted on
09/15/2008 7:42:30 PM PDT by
Carley
(she's all out of caribou.............)
To: paul in cape
Why would they investigate themselves?
To: paul in cape
13 posted on
09/15/2008 8:57:24 PM PDT by
april15Bendovr
(Free Republic & Ron Paul Cult = oxymoron)
To: paul in cape
15 posted on
09/16/2008 6:31:43 AM PDT by
ex-Texan
(Ecclesiastes 5:10 - 20)
To: paul in cape; All
17 posted on
09/16/2008 7:17:42 PM PDT by
Wuli
To: paul in cape
Dodd got more money from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac than anybody in Congress.
Barack Obama was second in line.
McCain needs to be all over this one. He should be calling on Barack Obama to GIVE BACK THE MONEY. He should beat Obama like a rented mule on this issue for the next two weeks.
The Democrats are going to try to get out in front of this issue. McCain has to tie it to their tails, like Mowgli tied the burning branch to Shere Khan's tail at the end of The Jungle Book. The way to do that is to name names.
Start with Dodd.
Start with Obama.
Start with the Dirty Dozen Senators who got the most money, Democrat or Republican, and let the chips fall where they may.
Start with Jim Johnson, who Obama picked to find a VEEP
Start with Penny Pritzker - National Finance Chair for Obama
McCain is the Maverick. Palin is the Barracuda. McCain and Palin will clean up this mess. McCain will name names and take on the crooks in Congress who got us in this jam. Palin will clean out the vipers nest and introduce transparency and competition, like she did in Alaska with the oil contracts.
That is the theme. McCain and Palin need to hammer it home.
18 posted on
09/17/2008 4:31:45 AM PDT by
gridlock
(The Democrats have attacked Motherhood. Now if they attack Baseball and Apple Pie, we're all set!)
To: paul in cape; All
19 posted on
09/17/2008 1:15:46 PM PDT by
Wuli
To: paul in cape; All
20 posted on
09/17/2008 1:19:53 PM PDT by
Wuli
To: paul in cape
There wasn't an individual thread on this one, but I feel it needs to be included here because it is definitely relevant:
From the NYT - 2003
New Agency Proposed to Oversee Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae
By STEPHEN LABATON
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.
''There is a general recognition that the supervisory system for housing-related government-sponsored enterprises neither has the tools, nor the stature, to deal effectively with the current size, complexity and importance of these enterprises,'' Treasury Secretary John W. Snow told the House Financial Services Committee in an appearance with Housing Secretary Mel Martinez, who also backed the plan
================================================
Fannie Mae, which was previously known as the Federal National Mortgage Association, and Freddie Mac, which was the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation, have been criticized by rivals for exerting too much influence over their regulators.
''The regulator has not only been outmanned, it has been outlobbied,'' said Representative Richard H. Baker, the Louisiana Republican who has proposed legislation similar to the administration proposal and who leads a subcommittee that oversees the companies. ''Being underfunded does not explain how a glowing report of Freddie's operations was released only hours before the managerial upheaval that followed. This is not world-class regulatory work.''
Significant details must still be worked out before Congress can approve a bill. Among the groups denouncing the proposal today were the National Association of Home Builders and Congressional Democrats who fear that tighter regulation of the companies could sharply reduce their commitment to financing low-income and affordable housing.
''These two entities -- Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- are not facing any kind of financial crisis,'' said Representative Barney Frank of Massachusetts, the ranking Democrat on the Financial Services Committee. ''The more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing.''
Representative Melvin L. Watt, Democrat of North Carolina, agreed.
''I don't see much other than a shell game going on here, moving something from one agency to another and in the process weakening the bargaining power of poorer families and their ability to get affordable housing,'' Mr. Watt said. 21 posted on
09/17/2008 1:46:47 PM PDT by
bamahead
(Few men desire liberty; most men wish only for a just master. -- Sallust)
To: paul in cape
22 posted on
09/17/2008 1:48:39 PM PDT by
WOBBLY BOB
(Conservatives are to McCain what Charlie Brown is to Lucy.)
To: paul in cape; All
23 posted on
09/17/2008 1:59:13 PM PDT by
Wuli
To: paul in cape
Another question is: Where’s the investigation of StallTroopWithdrawalGate?
To: paul in cape; All
25 posted on
09/17/2008 2:13:07 PM PDT by
Wuli
To: paul in cape; All
26 posted on
09/17/2008 2:22:29 PM PDT by
Wuli
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