Barney Frank tries to hide the evidence

Congressman Barney Frank is a master of comedic timing. His skill with the quick quip is so refined he has managed so far to divert public attention from his almost single-handed loss of $100 billion, going on $1 trillion.

His 15 years of manipulating Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to back and buy $1 trillion worth of bad home loans made the 2008 financial meltdown inevitable. It wasn’t funny at all, and just about every American except him is paying the price for his recklessness.

He still has the timing. Three days after a Massachusetts Democrat went down in flames in a special election for U.S. Senate, Barney Frank announced he favors abolishing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. He is calculating that if he looks as if he’s doing something about the two anemic mortgage giants, Massachusetts voters will be too distracted to notice it was he who sucked Fannie and Freddie dry.

Riddle me this: Once Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are disbanded, what would Barney Frank replace them with? Who would pay bribes as big as Fannie and Freddie did to the Democrats and Republicans? Who would give Democrats the gold-plated patronage jobs that Fannie and Freddie provided? Who would Democrats go to, to find home loans for friends and voters who can’t possibly afford to pay them back?

And now that Barney Frank has destroyed Fannie and Freddie, which remaining institution will back new home loans for the average families who normally would qualify for them? Or has he killed the American dream of homeownership?

Barney Frank ignores these questions. Now, even the best-timed answer could not get him a laugh.

Frank Warner

Comments

[Kevin]

Link needs fixing.

I think what Barney is saying is that he's tricked out Mae and Mac as much as he can, and can no longer use it as a vehicle to redistribute wealth. Therefore, a new model must be created so he can do it all over again.

Sadly, people are saying his seat is safe :(.

[Neo]

Jan. 29 (Bloomberg) — Russia urged China to dump its Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac bonds in 2008 in a bid to force a bailout of the largest U.S. mortgage-finance companies, former Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said.
Paulson learned of the “disruptive scheme” while attending the Beijing Summer Olympics, according to his memoir, “On The Brink.”
The Russians made a “top-level approach” to the Chinese “that together they might sell big chunks of their GSE holdings to force the U.S. to use its emergency authorities to prop up these companies,” Paulson said, referring to the acronym for government sponsored entities. The Chinese declined, he said.

Why does this smell of South Ossetia ?

Did the Russians eventually trigger the near financial collapse ?

Does this mean it wasn't Bush's fault ?