Posted on 10/28/2008 4:40:48 PM PDT by Libloather
Frank now calls homeownership emphasis 'a mistake'
By Jim O’Sullivan/State House News Service
Tue Oct 28, 2008, 10:59 AM EDT
Belmont, Mass. -
U.S. Rep. Barney Frank said Monday that fewer prospective homebuyers will qualify for mortgages as a result of the financial meltdown, calling that trend a positive byproduct because "tens of millions" of people are not suited to own homes.
Chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, Frank said the market will likely encourage a large increase in affordable rental housing. Answering critics who said he was working to deny low-income people access to their own homes, Frank said, "I'm not denying them the right to own a home, circumstances are."
“We made a mistake as a society in promoting homeownership as a universal achievable goal,” he said.
He also signaled a massive increase in regulations, saying the federal government would impose rules on "the securitization activities of all financial entities in the United States," including capital requirements to ensure solvency.
After addressing the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce, Frank told reporters that concerns of Democratic hegemony in Washington come January were largely confined to people with deregulation agendas. "I think that just bespeaks a mentality that doesn't understand how we got into this situation," he said.
Frank said the economy, which he told the audience was in “a serious recession,” had suffered a setback after the response to the credit crisis when other aspects of the economy started draining confidence. "Until we can get a stimulus package passed, I will be very nervous," he said.
That package, he said, should include funding for states to stanch layoffs, construction projects like roads and bridges, and extended unemployment benefits.
Massachusetts, Frank said, has been buffered from economic fallout in part by its large health care and higher education sectors.
The Newton Democrat also reiterated his call for a substantial reduction in the military budget, saying the US armed forces had become "overextended."
A second round of the federal economic bailout package, totaling $125 billion, would help smaller banks, Frank said. He said the local banks would be subject to the same rules.
“Although, frankly the community banks aren’t the ones who had this outrageous overpayment of the CEOs that we’ve been trying to stop,” Frank told the reporters.
Tom Callahan, executive director of the Massachusetts Affordable Housing Alliance, called Frank’s message warning against universal homeownership “healthy.”
“It’s clear that there should be room in housing policy and American politics for a strong rental policy,” said Callahan. “I think homeownership is not going to be right for everyone for a variety of reasons.”
“We let the free market set housing policy for a while in this country, and you can see what we get when we do that,” Callahan said.
Speaking to a crowded Marriott Boston Copley hotel ballroom, Frank quipped, after a discussion of the decision to cap executive compensation for companies that partake in the $700 billion rescue plan, “There are audiences that greet that news with more cheer than this one.”
Hey Barney, liberal politicians including you, judges, attorneys, and “a certain community organizer” made the mistake about home ownership for everyone. The banks, their employees, and most Amercans all told you guys it was ludicrous to loan money to people who couldn’t afford it, had bad credit, no down payment, etc. The banks only started loaning the money to ineligible borrowers after they were forced to do so!
You are correct,Sir/Madam....on both counts.M. Stanley Dukakis (which is how one Boston talk host refers to him) hails from the town of Brookline,Massachusetts which (still) proudly claims him as a native son.Today Brookline is represented in Congress by Barney Frank,the Senior Senator from Chappaquiddick and that other guy who "tanked",John F'en Kerry.
I share much of your frustration about the GOP but there are several things you should consider. When the Republicans were the majority it was by a very thin margin. The Dems blocked everything by either filibustering or using other procedural devices to block legislation. Even speaking out loud and clear is not very effective if the MSM doesn't carry it.
We have been in the middle of a Leftist conspiracy for years and it has intensified in the past ten. The GOP has not been bereft of good conservatives but overcoming the media has become almost impossible.
In 2003 President Bush and the conservative Republicans made a major effort to enact legislation to regulate and straighten out Fannie and Freddie. They were rebuffed by the Dems.
Do a search using the key words President Bush Fannie Mae 2003 and you will find tons of information. The MSM just did not cover it.
-- Comment on Bill O'Reilly's website
I’ll give Bush some credit. However milquetoast statements buried in yearly budgetary meeting is hardly a clarian call to action.
I give him a D+ for effort.
While it is certainly true of the MSM, I cannot and I challenge you to find ANY mention of the FannieMae/Freddie Mac fiasco BEFORE the dam burst on the congressmen/senators' OWN WEBSITES, their speeches back home in their districts and local media which is not so biased, or any speeches on C-SPAN during their one minute speeches.
I led you by the hand to get the pertinent information, most of it about more than "... milquetoast statements buried in yearly budgetary meeting... " but you seem uninterested in the truth, preferring instead to defend your already established presumption without the necessary research.
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