So, the blame game has started on bailouts. What amazes me is how and why McCain and Republicans are getting most of the blame for this mess when it was the Democrats who rebuffed efforts to regulate and reform government mandated lending policies. Yes, Virginia, these mandated laws forced banks to lend money to folks who wouldn’t normally be able to buy a home.
Like they said: Government policy made perfectly good renters lousy homeowners. It was effectively Affirmative Action Housing and not only has it not promoted affordable housing, it is crushing the country. Read this lovely article and see what the NY Times had to say in 1999. The constituent group this was supporting was certainly not Republican…..yet, the Republicans are getting blamed for it……totally amazing. Both parties failed on this to be sure, but McCain didn’t. He co-sponsored legislation and stood up in 2005 to warn the country. The bill was blocked by guys like Barney Frank. It is amazing to see how these politicans are so convinced they had nothing to do with this…..it is also amazing that the media isn’t telling the true story here and is buying the Pelosi line that this is all some Bush and McCain conspiracy to screw the country. While Obama sits back and does nothing….and did nothing but take $162,000 from Fannie Mae in campaign funds (to be fair McCain took $21,000). Yet, Obama reaps the benefits by kicking back and staying out of the mix. Is this leadership? It seems that on the one hand we want our politicans to fix things, when they try to they get singled out as part of the problem…..what does this cause? It causes pols like Obama to lay low and the media ignores not only his personal and professional culpability, but it completely ignores the culpability of the Democratic party blocking efforts to regulate. Thank goodness for YouTube videos of Congressional Committee hearings on the subject….the differences between Democratic and Republican members in 2004 and 2005 is as clear as day. Republicans wanted regulation, the Democrats were ticked off that the regulator was bothering Freddie and Fannie because they were “financially sound”. Can anyone explain to me why the Democrats are getting a free pass and Obama and Democrats look like they are going to get a cake walk when they majorly contributed to this mess?
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Gato got runned over by Marcus many moons ago. Be ye daft, 2486? 
Let's have a new poll, alright, Joe?
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{ 27 comments… read them below or add one }
You’re amazed? Honestly?
When looked at in isolation, I can see how you can manage to be amazed that Republicans are getting more than half the blame for this. There is a good reason why neither McCain or Obama want to get too deeply into this issue because it does not divide so neatly by political party.
First of all, if you believe that democrats are the only ones who had a constituancy that benefited from artificially accelerating housing prices and lending so carelessly, you need to crush some tin foil over your head because you are getting some bad reception.
Is it irresponsible low rent people forcing the banks to give them loans they don’t deserve through Democratic induced mandates ? …. OR ….Predatory banks with complacent Republican appointed Administrators lining their pockets at any costs to the greater good? The answer is somewhere in the middle.
Again, I agree Republicans are getting too much of the blame. I don’t agree that if you ask your inner child that he will be amazed tho. A few reasons I can think of at the moment:
When Bush took office huge budget surplus. After two terms of Bush – unfathomably huge deficite.
The initial proposal by Bush administration was ridiculous and contained exaggerated urgency so they could sneak something through with provisions that made it impossible for them to have any accountability or oversight. In other words, one person in the Bush administration having the power over 700 billion in tax payer money and doesn’t have to answer to anyone. This reminds people of how the Iraq war was sold. I know you Bundy were critical of this proposal too so I am not implying you weren’t. I am just saying that these sort of things do not happen in isolation. They reflect poorly on Republicans the most.
Another thing, McCain has already openly admitted he doesn’t know much about economics and. It is good that he tells the truth about that, but he might as well say “If the economy is in bad shape, I am not your guy.” His eratic behavior (saying fundamentals of economy were strong, suspending his campaign, but not actually suspending his campaign, blatently lying to David Letterman why he wasn’t coming on his show, saying he wouldn’t show up to debate unless the bill was passed, then showing up to the debate anyway even though bill was not signed (exposing that it was probably a political tactic), tons of mixed messages, etc.) didn’t exactly inspire confidence in his leadership for economic issues or his ability act calmly under political pressure. Many Republicans were critical of this too. Whether this perception is fair or not, it is of his own doing.
Republicans claiming that they did not come through with the number votes they promised and that the bill did not pass at the last minute because Polosi made some political comments that were nothing unusual for congress of either party – this made them look like wimps and that they let their hurt feelings get in the way of what they themselves thought was best for the country. Then when they were getting called out on this even by members of their own party, they quickly dropped that excuse.
These are just a couple of the reasons why one should not be amazed that Republicans are catching the most heat for this. Again, whether it’s deserved or not, they unfortunately dug their own hole.
Can you spell A-C-O-R-N…………?
Thanks for the comments anyhow.
Brian..pretty much right on by me.. The original poster definetly needs some kind of an udjustment. He sounded like a politcal announcemnt for McCain..I think he is definetly a staunch republican no matter how smart or stupid the canadate happens to be. To me that is pretty ignorant. The Bank presidents, CEO’s & CFO’s are the bad guys in this deal. The republican’s elected officials (not the demacrats alone) were behind the disaterus deregulation of the banking and securities industry. Hell the subprime lenders where pushing 125% loans on mortages..That is just crazy. The big shots in these large cooperation’s and financial institutions Cooked The Books….They showed inflated numbers and projections for current and future business & in return recieved millions of dollars in bonus monies. I would wager to bet if the government looked where they needed to and caught these thieving leaders of major cooperations. Locked them up and siezed there assets for the last five years., we wouldnt need a $700,000 taxpayer bail-out.I say screw them let’em rot broke and in jail!!!!!
We don’t need a $700,000,000,000 (over $850B now) bail-out because it’s just going to crash anyway. That’s the real issue. You can dumb it down to party politics if you want, but it’s really the irresponsible among us that practice bad spending habits.
Let the damn thing crash and stop delaying the inevitable. I want to get this depression over it with the least impression on my children as adults.
Pretty good response there MyBrain. Bundy consistently drinks of and regurgitates the Rush flavored koolaid. Just google up the NYT article and see the quantity of links to right wing disinformation sites. Funny how the gray lady is all of a sudden a paragon of right wing virtues instead of the librul media.
Bundy and I have disagreed before on McCain’s supposed absolution of guilt in this regard. Certainly no one can disagree that McCain helped enable the cult of de-regulation that had an ideological grip on the Republican Party for decades. But also McCain has confessed to the economy not being his strong suit. Instead he’s repeatedly stated his reliance on his economic advisers, chief among them is Phil Gramm. Here’s a well researched article on Gramm’s role in the mess:
http://losangeles.injuryboard.com/miscellaneous/the-subprime-mess-and-phil-gramm-an-experiment-in-deregulation.aspx?googleid=242468
Here’s a very recent article on why Fannie and Freddie are not solely to blame.
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/251/story/53802.html
I agree there’s significant blame to be shared. To begin understanding the problem go here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subprime_mortgage_crisis
I found this 60 minutes episode on the shodow market much more relevant to enormity of the failure than trying to peg it on the underlying loans. It was a failure of regulation of securities that is causing the worldwide collapse, not a bunch of misguided low income people as Bundy implies.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GT76vCHKzGM
The financial crisis has been fueled by a number of reasons, among them, government policy helping people profit from risky loans. This was certainly the case with Lehman, Freddy and Fannie…..and numerous persons signing for risky loans being handed out by predatory lenders. My premise in writing the article was not that it was as Barney Frank said, to put the blame on poor people, it was to highlight how Obama is benefiting and McCain is getting blamed for this mess. My argument is that both parties failed, and with Democrats in Congress the last two years, nothing was done to fix it, yet the Republicans are getting the blame. If the roles had been reversed you can bet with certainty that everyone would have been blaming the Republicans outright…..that is not happening now…..you have to ask yourself why?
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Does anyone not see that the American People are still getting screwed and the people that created this mess are telling us “WHO” to blame and “WHO” not to blame? If you follow the money it will tell you everything, but hey go right on believing Sisyphyus putting this on McCain. I am sure that will make it all better won’t it? Ask yourself who got more money Obama ($162,000) or McCain ($21,000)……….money talks louder than anything else I could possibly say here.
The first commenter is right: this cannot be neatly isolated by political party. So whoever has the worst reaction or leadership on the crisis currently will get more of the blame.
Check out the White House’s own website to see the “accomplishments” they are proud of regarding Bush’s “Home Ownership Expansion Program”. If they could take this page down without anyone noticing, I’m sure they would.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/infocus/achievement/chap7.html
McCain is smart not to focus too much on the background of this problem since everyone had a significant hand in it. It is more about who can demonstrate/convince that they are better able to lead the country out of the crisis than the other candidate.
A lot can happen in a few weeks. McCain still has time to show that he is better for the country in this regard.
Trying to place blame for the meltdown is a waste of brain cells.
It’s litter box politics- poke around in a litterbox, and you’ll find exactly what you expect to find, but you’ll have a hard time proving which cat provided the evidence.
More crap on IFT.
Why do we always get the blame, mew mew? C’mon, boomer, we’re also entertaining! Mew mew!
Hi, Cute Kitty…
Yes, indeed!
Charlie Brown sighs and sez, “Oh brother!”
Winnie The Pooh eats a spoonful of honey an says Oh Bother!
I blame the current crisis on aliens from outer space. Thats what I would say if it were a science fiction problem which it is not. I actually point the blame on both Republicans und Democrats. Also, predatory banks which were like lions who preyed on the Cape Buffalo in the savannah of Africa. Citizens of the Americas need to take this blame as well because the people who could not afford mortgages had no business getting them. In my small town of Gurkelkleintz, Austria we would after these nusiance people in our town. You must stop blaming McCain for this because it is unfair to do so. You might as well blame Obama for it and would not be racist if you did so you politically correct society.
The american taxpayer is footing the bill to bailout these banks and they have the audacity to put aside billions of dollars for end of year bonuses when they were the ones who put us in this financial crisis to begin with? Break out the pitch-forks and torches and lets go after these bastards!
I agree #16 if what you say about year end bonuses is true. They should be pitch-forked and torched. But to be realistic, what can we as John Q Public do? I don’t have a clue as to what to do about the situation. Anyone out there have any suggestions?
Stop putting money in their pockets – make them fail whether the government wants them to or not.
#17—don’t vote for Simpson (or any incumbent that supported this lunacy).
I was one of the “little people’ that was given a home loan that was totally out of my reach. I was shocked when it went through, and even though the payments were way more than I could afford, the seller (manufactured home dealership) pushed the issue with elaborate pulling of the heartstrings till I gave in.
This ended badly, as you can well imagine, and for years I blamed the now-defunct dealership and the bank for my woes.
Only recently, be it due to different perspective, or maybe just growing-up, I’ve realized that I hold the blame for putting myself into that situation. People can blame the banks all they want for giving loans to people who can’t afford them, but honestly, is there one of you out there who doesn’t know what you can afford and what you can’t?
I’m not a politician or a financial genius (obviously lol) so I can’t claim to know what to do about the current national financial situation, but I can say that a good first step would be for us “little people” to stop thinking we have to live like the Hiltons and be more financially responsible on an individual level. If we wouldn’t have let these greedy people talk us into things we really couldn’t afford (and yes, we all knew it) then we wouldn’t be where we are today.
**steps off soapbox**
you go, girl!
when we bought a house three years ago, we were faced with the same pressures; our realtor was pulling out all the stops with top-end houses which I felt were overpriced and out of our comfort level, budget wise….she also had connections to several “mortgage brokers” who would pre approve us in a matter of minutes for large sums of money…….
after some serious soul-searching, my husband and I made a low-ball offer on a fixer upper…….which was, surprisingly enough in that market, accepted….I am now very happy that my house has retained its value and we didn’t go wayyyyy out on a limb for a “better” house……but Alice I know exactly what you mean; it is very, very tempting when you have all the people you are relying on to provide info to you telling you to “go for it”. . . . .
Great comment Alice! You are absolutely right: everyone knows what they can and can’t afford and unfortunately too many people want to portray to their friends and neighbors that they have more than what they actually do and this is how so many folks got into trouble. Thanks for sharing your story.
I got sucked into the ARM thing about 3.5 years ago. Had a plan of attack from the start, and refinanced in June. However, I had no clue that the mortgage company (Countrywide) wanted to screw me with that ARM as bad as they did…glad I started the process in February.
We got lucky with a no money down home loan, and our home will last us a LONG time. It’ll be a family raiser. We stayed within our means, and had to deal with some scary times during the refinance…but I consider it worth it.
Hooray for debt, eh?
Hi, Marcus…
So- now you’re on a fixed rate mortgage? I hope so!
Ya know folks, there is no roadmap out of this mess. You and Alice both had a natural aspiration- you wanted a home of your own to build a family in. There are lots of reasons why all the financing junk started, but at the bottom of it were 2 big blocks to buying a home- the steady rise of the cost of building materials and the over-valued ground the materials went on.
Idaho Falls isn’t anywhere as close to crazy as other states with this, but only because we still have land that’s cheap. Land speculation has often been the cause of this country’s worst economic busts right from the beginning.
Way far too many new houses are oversized around here now. I could go off on a rant about how we have become an oversized society, but I’ll save it for another topic- it bears deeper discussion. I’ll leave it with the thought that these elephants are going to be tough sellers forever more, and will be seen in the future as testaments to a cultural sickness that we once succumbed to.
Yes, fixed rate FHA – 6.5 percent 30 year, $92k. The rate is higher than I would like it to be, but it’s better than the 6.9 30 year adjustable for $70k and 11.5 15 year adjustable for $20k that I was paying. Payment dropped right around $100/mo. Taxes upset me more than anything else – $1,066/yr is a bit much for a .084 acre lot, but it is right on top of down town.
Glad I didn’t buy a new house. Originally, we paid $87,500 – we were working with real estate agents and the owner, so they swallowed taxes and doc fees and all that fun stuff to keep us at 87,500 flat. Split the loan up to be an adjustable mortgage, did a second shorter term mortgage to cover down payment and we were in business. Most importantly – we knew (for the most part) what we were doing. I’m happy with my 1933 4 bedroom 2 bath 1488 sq. ft. cozy home on a small plot of land – does me pretty well for $650/mo. That’s only $200 more than I paid monthly for my 2 bedroom 700 sq. ft. apartment in 2005!
There be some perks to home ownership – even though it means tens of thousands of dollars in debt. I hate debt.
Hi, Marcus…
Smart moves all around! Good work.
I agree- I prefer older homes, too. I’ve owned 5 homes over the years; the oldest was built in 1904, the newest built in 1997. I came to really dislike the new house, which was in the middle of a subdivision where everything was built from 1997 to brand new.
My current house was built in 1958, and I like it the best of any I’ve owned. I bought it for $12,000 less than the 1997 house, and it’s much better built and has much better light througout. That 1997 house may appreciate more over time, but this one is much more liveable and I don’t have any plans to move again. I really love my mature trees and a mature neighborhood- more birds, more settled neighbors- lots of advantages in quality of life stuff.
The taxes are a pain in the butt, but in time, the appreciation of your house will sure help if you ever need a new roof, a better garage, or whatever. Re-financing is not a bad thing if you are careful and if you put the money back into the home.
Well, my refinance went nowhere except for the home. I didn’t borrow against my equity in the process at all.