Posted on 12/17/2011 8:44:22 PM PST by Steelfish
DECEMBER 17, 2011 Gingrich of Freddie Mac The Speaker's defense is hurting him as much as his $1.6 million payday.
Newt Gingrich's opponents aren't letting up in their criticism of his lucrative ties to the failed mortgage giant Freddie Mac after he resigned as House Speaker in the late 1990s. More damaging to his Presidential candidacy is that Mr. Gingrich doesn't seem to understand why anyone is offended.
In his first response after news broke that he'd made $300,000 working for Freddie, Mr. Gingrich claimed he had "offered them advice on precisely what they didn't do." As a "historian," he said during a November 9 debate, he had concluded last decade that "this is a bubble," and that Freddie and its sister Fannie Mae should stop making loans to people who have no credit history. He added that now they should be broken up.
A week later Bloomberg reported that Mr. Gingrich had made between $1.6 million and $1.8 million in two separate contracts with Freddie between 1999 and 2008. The former Speaker stuck to his line that "I was approached to offer strategic advice" and had warned the government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs) to stop lending to bad credit risks.
Then on December 2 our colleagues at the Journal reported that as late as April 2007 Mr. Gingrich had defended Fannie and Freddie as examples of conservative governance. "While we need to improve the regulation of the GSEs, I would be very cautious about fundamentally changing their role or the model itself," Mr. Gingrich said in an interview at the time.
Mr. Gingrich added in that interview that there are times "when you need government to help spur private enterprise and economic development."
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
Willard will lose and we get Fo' Mo' Years of Marxism.
The kind of brutal scrutiny the GOP candidates have been subjected to is UNHEARD OF in American History.
The fact is NOBODY is perfect. And Gingrich and ALL OF THEM, despite any of their flaws - and as human beings we all have them - are FAR BETTER than the Marxist Muslim in the White House. If we are not going to support a candidate unless they are PERFECT in every way, we will never find such a candidate anywhere on earth.
We have to STOP micro scrutinizing these candidates and start ZEROING IN on Obama. NOW. Before the Mainstream Media TOTALLY discredit each and every GOP candidate in the public eye long before they ever battle that Marxist Muslim Bastard for the Presidency.
Keep on talking about Newt and Fannie Mae while all the democrat corruption and cover up by Frank and Dodd and the Black in the house etc etc is muted
Well said and illustrated!
It's called "guilt by association", and it's one of the lowest and laziest logical fallacies. Since FM was in the sup-prime mortgage business, and Newt did work for them, then Newt is guilty of FM's indiscretions. Even though many admit right on this thread that they have NO IDEA what he was actually paid for. It's the kind of tenuous tie that a, say, Michele Bachman might use to say Newt was "for partial-birth abortion."
More commonly referred to as a capitalist.
Roads, post office, central banks, Louisiana Purchase .... all promoted during the first 30 years after the Constitution. And if you think the United States Military is just there to protect you from being enslaved and but secure your entitlement to private property and gain, you are do not know your history.
Any organization can be corrupted, even Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac when it is turned into a vehicle for redistribution of wealth, read Red Lining.
The problem is not with Freddie Mac, who in it’s pure from could be a benefit to our society, but in the corrupt leftists that used it to line their pockets. and to stay in office, much as they are fixing to do with all those yummy health-care dollars.
And don’t forget the biggest boondoggle of them all.....Global Warming....guaranteed loans to contributors, state, local, utility and Federal tax deductions/credits for financially inefficient energy makeovers; and the real intent is the spreading the government tentacles into the your freedoms while making the Progressive/Liberals more powerful and rich.
Then Romney is your boy. You can trust everything he says.
I guess this is your way of deflecting criticism on your candidate. I told you Romney isn’t one I’d vote for. Your stubbornness doesn’t equate to capitulation for Romney on my part. Defend your pick instead of crazy accusations.
the accusation that Gingrich did anything wrong while working for Freddie Mac is crazy.
Not one person has come forward with any claim that what he did was either illegal or unethical. The accusation is simply that he worked for the company before it went belly up. Guilt by association. Typical liberal tactic.
Now defend YOUR guy. (Whoever the hell it is).
If you reread my post you will see that I did not claim such. I said I only wanted to see documentation of what his ‘consultation’ entailed - which you take as a slam and automatic vote for the puke Romeny.
You are as full of as much BS as Newt is, who I know of very very well as my former Congressman. You really are not worth arguing with if this is all you’ve got.
Newton says Newton is a progressive in the model of Hamilton and Teddy Roosevelt.
Newt says he wants to improve Freddie Mac and help people buy homes who otherwise wouldn’t qualify.
It depends on how many times and to what extent. Newt likes to count those time with the second hand of his watch from Tiffany’s.
Our founders set up a government that would be as national and as powerful as England’s parliament when the House, States and the president, elected by the electoral college agreed but only then. When there is disagreement between the three, government is supposed to be as insignificant as Jefferson wanted.
The problem today is that the power continues on and on when there is no agreement. Newt likes that power. He encourages it. He wants to make it bigger and more effective.
ARPA-net, like velcro, was not created for the public. It was created to maintain communications between the military in case our communications were attacked. It had an incidental civilian application which has proven to be very valuable.
Newt doesn’t speak of things like ARPA-net. Newt speaks of things like Solyndra.
What advice did Freddie Mac get that Freddie Mac thought was worth $1.6million? Do you really think Newt proposed to tell them how damaging their existence was and they said, “We’ll take $1.6million of that!”
Ha! Good point.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.