How Corruption Destroyed the U.S. Economy

The Democrats were quick to point fingers at the Republicans about how our economy got so screwed up. It’s as if they were counting on the short memories of the American voter and the cooperation of the press to pull that one off. Just so everybody is on the same page and knows exactly how we got here lets take a look at some history. The problem began before the sub-prime lending fiasco and long before George W. Bush became president.

Mass. Rep. Barney Frank (D) who is no stranger to controversy is the Chairman and ranking member of the House Financial Services Committee. This committee has jurisdiction over Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac. Barney Frank made use of his time on this committee during the Clinton years to deregulate those financial institutions. We don’t exactly know why he wanted to do this, but there does appear to be a conflict of interest for Barney Frank who also happens to be openly gay. Barney Frank’s boyfriend, Herb Moses, was an exec at Fannie Mae from 1991 to 1998. http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,432501,00.html This obvious conflict of interest was even pointed out to Frank by the Wall Street Journal.

In a recent interview on ABC News former President Bill Clinton recently stated “I think the responsibility the Democrats have may rest more in resisting any efforts by Republicans in the Congress or by me when I was President to put some standards and tighten up a little on Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.” This might just be his way of trying to protect himself because in 1998 he appointed Franklin Raines from his own administration to run Fannie Mae. See a video of what else the Democrats did to allow this crisis to happen. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LSqhrHIfJV0&NR=1

According to President Bill Clinton, he and the Republicans were trying to fix this problem as far back as the 90’s. That only explains how the House of Representatives were able to get Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac deregulated.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch. ACORN used the C­om­­m­­unit­y Re­inve­st­m­­e­nt­ Ac­t­ to sue Citigroup in an effort to force them to provide mortgages to people who couldn’t qualify for them. The case was eventually settled out of court. Who was one of the attorneys representing ACORN? Barack Obama.

With Barack Obama representing them ACORN was able to strong-arm other banking institutions into providing mortgages to people that couldn’t qualify. Why couldn’t they qualify? Because their credit rating was too low or their income level wasn’t high enough. Put another way, Obama sued a bank because they wouldn’t issue loans to people who already had a history of not making payments or didn’t have the money to make the payments. Some of these mortgages were even made to illegal aliens. These extremely risky mortgages were packaged together and sold to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Fannie Mae already had the House in their pocket. How did they get their hooks into the Senate? Enter Senator Chris Dodd a Democrat from Connecticut.

Sen. Dodd is the Chairman of the Senate banking committee. Can we see where this is going now? How could Dodd have been pressured into compromising himself? Earlier this year it was revealed that Senator Dodd received some questionable mortgages from Countrywide in 2003. Apparently, there is an e-mail out in cyberland from Countrywide execs to give Dodd a lower rate just because he is a U.S. Senator. This investigation has been delayed until after the presidential election so as not to reflect negatively on the Democrats and their candidate Barack Obama. Instead of grilling the various CEOs of major banking institutions Senator Dodd should be on the witness stand testifying to Congress about how he took advantage of his elected position and compromised himself thereby sacrificing the American people. How did Dodd sacrifice the American people?

In 2003 President Bush proposed a new committee to clean up Fannie Mae, but the Democrats wouldn’t have it. The proposal would have this new committee fall under the Treasury Department instead of a corruptible Congress. Rep. Melvyn Watt, (D-NC) Committee on Financial Institutions & Consumer Credit. stated, “I don’t see much other than weakening the bargaining power of poorer families to get affordable housing.”

Fannie Mae was also contributing to the campaigns of 354 Senators and Congressmen. This probably had something to do with both houses of Congress so easily being able to turn a blind eye to what was happening within these financial institutions. By now its public knowledge that Sen. Chris Dodd received more money than anybody else in Congress from Fannie Mae and Sen. Barack Obama was next. Rep. Barney Frank was #4. Who was #3? Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) Chairman of the Finance Committee. Fannie Mae also made contributions to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (-CA) and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV). Paying off these last two Democrats ensured that restrictive legislation would never make it to the floor of either house for a vote. Fannie Mae owned the very politicians who were responsible for the oversight of that institution.

If the Democrats didn’t want to see the problems in 2003 when President Bush proposed a fix then they should have seen it in 2004. That’s then the Office of Management and Budget conducted an investigation into the finances of Fannie Mae. What they found was that Franklin Raines had earned somewhere between $50-$100 million since being appointed by President Clinton in 1998. The OMB also found fraudulent bookkeeping that triggered huge bonuses for the execs at Fannie Mae. This was overshadowed by the Enron collapse and Congress swept the scandal under the rug.

However, Franklin Raines was forced to resign. That year the
Democrats campaigned against corruption pointing the finger at Republicans and they finally took over both over both houses of Congress never letting the American public know the true extent of the crisis looming just over the horizon, the conduct of a Clinton appointee at Fannie Mae or the extent of corruption within their own party.

Prior to the elections of 2004 the Republicans controlled the House of Representatives and held hearings investigating the fraudulent bookkeeping at Fannie Mae. The Democrats covered up the findings. Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) even said “Mr. Chairman we don’t have a crisis at Freddie Mac and particularly at Fannie Mae.” Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY) even had the nerve to question the competence of the regulators. See that video here. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_MGT_cSi7Rs&feature=related
The Democrats defend and the Republicans call for more regulations.

In January 2005 the interim CEO of Fannie Mae even spoke at the swearing in ceremony of the Congressional Black Caucus. During his speech he admitted there were problems in his company and even asked for help from the Congressional Black Caucus while he also referred to them as “family”. Barack Obama was present during this speech. Watch the video here. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usvG-s_Ssb0

In 2005 Senator John McCain warned of the problems posed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. McCain states “If Congress does not act, American taxpayers will continue to be exposed to the enormous risk that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac pose to the housing market, the overall financial system, and the economy as a whole.” The Democrats ignored McCain’s warnings.

The current presidential candidate for the Democrat Party, Barack Obama, has been quick to place the blame on John McCain for deregulating these financial institutions. Obama has even tried to blame the last 8 years of Bush policies.

Obama is partly responsible for the economic crisis that we’re currently in. He helped create the problem and now he wants us to elect him because he says that he has the solution. He’s part of the problem! Electing him as our president is like having the fox watch the henhouse.

Franklin Raines is now an advisor to Barack Obama and Jim Johnson, another former Fannie Mae exec, vetted Obama’s VP selection.

The Democrats loosened the restrictions on Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac and took payoffs from those organizations to not do their duty and oversee the practices there. Democrats killed every Republican effort to reign in the financial institutions.
History shows us that the Democrats did more than just contribute to the economic mess we’re now in. They took payoffs to ignore the warning signs. The Democrats were derelict in their duty. The last thing we need now is a derelict in the White House. What Americans should do is vote all of the Democrats out of Congress and get some new meat in there that will do their jobs and clean up this mess

Obama's Economy

While most people who work in this country have income taxes deducted from their paycheck, many have those taxes refunded to them in a nice sized check. Sometimes they actually receive more than they actually paid. It’s been estimated that only 60% of individuals don’t receive all of their withheld taxes from the IRS. Put another way, only 60% of working Americans are paying income taxes.

Senator Obama claims that he would cut taxes for 95% of Americans. Wouldn’t that mean that he’s going to give more money back to people who already get all of their money back from the IRS? What does that mean for the people who currently receive more money than they pay into the system? Are they going to get even more money back? Where does that extra money come from? The government took it from somebody else! Currently, 60% of working Americans are supporting 100% of our population. Under Senator Obama’s plan the 60% paying taxes would decrease and the percentage of people being supported would increase over 40%.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see that these numbers don’t add up and that such a lopsided ratio can’t last for long. It’s no wonder we have deficits every year. Throw in the national debt and our country is headed for a train wreck. No wonder politicians keep saying they have to reform Social Security and other programs. They’ve had to steal the surpluses from these programs in order to make up the shortfalls in other programs.

On top of the obvious crisis our government is speeding towards Obama wants to speed up the train with his promise of $800 billion in new spending. This was before the $700 billion bailout plan or “rescue package” depending on how you look at it. Even after this package became law Senator Obama still hasn’t amended his economic plan to compensate for the additional debt. We already owe China $500 billion and they don’t even like the United States. Is this man a flat-out liar or does he just not understand that the treasury has a finite amount of money?

Obama must be stopped. We know very little about him and less than a month before the election we still don’t know of any legislation he has ramrodded through either his state legislature or the U.S. Senate in his estimated 15 years in public office. Now, he’s asking us to promote him to the highest office in the land and he hasn’t even shown himself competent of his current or previous position. If nothing else, he’s proven that he has a complete misunderstanding of our economy.