Posted on 01/04/2009 7:46:57 AM PST by Libloather
Barney Frank expects GOP to resist regulations
By Jay Fitzgerald
Sunday, January 4, 2009 - Updated 3h ago
As chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, Rep. Barney Frank had a busy 2008 - working with Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke, Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson and others in an often desperate attempt to prevent a financial-system collapse.
But there’ll probably be little respite in 2009 for Frank.
The Newton Democrat is already setting ambitious goals for 2009: pushing for new regulations of the financial-services industry, bolstering affordable housing programs and passing consumer-protection laws.
Frank - who became a national figure this past fall during dramatic negotiations over what turned out to be an historic $700 billion bailout of the banking system - also plans to help the incoming Obama administration pass a giant economic stimulus package and distribute the remaining $350 billion from the bailout bill.
In an interview last week, Frank sounded somewhat optimistic that “improvements may be seen” in the economy by around this summer.
“Obama is doing the right thing” with his $500 billion-plus economic stimulus package, said Frank. “I think the American people are ready for better news.”
The usually gruff Frank, who became so well-known last year that he was parodied on Saturday Night Live, acknowledged that 2008 was “frustrating” because of the intense criticism aimed at him from conservatives.
Some of them - including Fox News talk-show host Bill O’Reilly, who had an on-air shouting match with Frank late last year - blamed Frank and other Democrats for creating, or at least not doing enough to avert, the subprime-mortgage fiasco.
“I couldn’t fight back at the time,” said Frank. “I was busy and waited until after the elections to respond. . . . (Critics) were trying to find something to blame other than the lack of regulations (over the financial system).”
To that end, Frank is serving notice that one of his top priorities this year is to indeed pass new regulatory guidelines for Wall Street and banks.
“We need to pass regulatory reforms to contain excessive risk taking,” said Frank, singling out complex financial transactions, such as credit-default swaps, as targets for future regulation.
Changes will apply to banks, investments banks and hedge funds, Frank warned.
Consumer protection inititiaves will focus on the credit-card industry and “excessive” overdraft fees charged by banks, he said.
Frank said he’s expecting stiff resistance to regulatory reforms from Republicans, who he insisted have embraced a “laissez-faire religion” that’s marginalized them in the debate over the economy.
“They have conceded the center,” said Frank. “Their right-wing (in the House) is in control. Are they going to stake out a ‘no new regulations’ position? I think they’re going to oppose all regulations, whether it’s for credit-default swaps or hedge funds.”
Whats got up his butt this time?
Oh....right.
Barney is an arsonist pretending to be a firefighter.
Putting Frank in charge of updating banking regulaions is exactly the same as putting an indescriminate child molester in charge of a day care center.
The GOP might as well give in. This industry is already a fully controlled subsidiary of Frank, Dodd & Co. anyway.
bolstering affordable housing programs and passing consumer-protection laws.
Nothing like repeating past mistakes (especially the mistakes that cause the current situation) to fix things.And who better to repeat the past the mistakes than the one who led the charge last time.
regulate this, bawney.
It is almost as if these events were engineered - under the watch of a compliant media - to further socialize the economy. Just enough toxic third-way market distortions and wham.
Rubin and Summers are responsible for the dismantling of the protections for banking.
By Jeff Poor
Business & Media Institute, 9/24/2008
excerpt...
"Frank, who is openly gay, had a relationship with Herb Moses, an executive for the now-government controlled Fannie Mae. The column revealed the two had split up at the time but also said Frank was referring to Moses as his "spouse." Another Washington Post report said Frank called Moses his "lover" and that the two were "still friends" after the breakup.
Frank was and remains a stalwart defender of Fannie Mae, which is now under FBI investigation along with its sister organization Freddie Mac, American International Group Inc. (NYSE:AIG) and Lehman Brothers (NYSE:LEH) – all recently participants in government bailouts. But Frank has derailed efforts to regulate the institution, as well as denying it posed any financial risk."
http://www.businessandmedia.org/printer/2008/20080924145932.aspx
You got that right. The criminal element of the RAT party, now known as the Communists/Socialists party has us by the n__. Little hope that the damage they will do for the next 8 years can ever be reversed. We are toast.
I don’t get it, the fixation on this queer by some freepers. I think it is much more important to ask when some of these banker thieves are going to jail and how laws are going to be made to prevent this BS again. Than what butt boy frank and his buttboy are doing.
Correction: "Still no investigation of the perp perv.
Must see video from 2004: 'Democrats Defend Fannie/Freddie from Regulation'. Watch it 'til the end. You will not believe it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YL36nwCSYUM
___________________________________________________________
History of Fannie Mae scandal
"Fannie Mae announces its long-awaited restatement, erasing $6.3 billion in profit from 2001 through June 30, 2004."
http://www.boston.com/business/articles/2006/12/07/history_of_fannie_mae_scandal/?page=1
Or "Fannie".
The true origin of this criminal enterprise lies squarely within Fannie, Freddie and the Democrat party. Without the lending policies enforced by the Democrats via Fannie, Freddie, the CRA and their accomplices -- ACORN and ACLU -- there would have been no crime! By bankers...or anybody else.
Nor, for that matter, any meltdown of the economy.
Indeed, many in the banking and mortgage community were as much a victim of this fraud as the taxpayers -- they bought securities issued by Fannie and Freddie, believing they were backed by "the full faith and credit, etc".
In a way, there is some equity involved in the bailout of the financial community -- as they were actually victimized by the government's action and might ordinarily expect recompense.
Any "banker thieves" implicated in this scandal were accomplices after the fact. The real perpetrators are represented by the likes of Barney Frank, etc. and the Democrat party in general.
Any "laws to prevent this kind of BS again" should restrain government from intervening in free markets -- as they clearly did in this case, with disastrous results.
Any conservative who is not directing their fire at the Democrats -- and is, instead, aiming at "banking thieves" -- is shooting straight thru to the fringe of the subject.
There seems to be a lot of that around here, lately. Which makes me somewhat suspicious...
This played a part in McVain's defeat.
And, If you want to think that the CRA caused 500+ trillion in derivatives then just keep living in your fantasy world.
Whiskey Tango Toxtrot? Frank is responsible for this mess, yet he wants to fund “more affordable housing”?
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