TAKE A LOAD OFF YOUR FANNIE & FREDDIE

AND YOU PUT THE LOAD RIGHT ON ME AND OTHER TAXPAYERS!

Amazing about how mum the major media outlets have been when it comes to another taxpayer bailout. I'm talking about the continuing taxpayer bailout of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. Here are the money quotes literally:

"WASHINGTON (AP) - Government-controlled mortgage buyer Freddie Mac managed a narrower loss of $1.7 billion for the October-December quarter of last year. But it has asked for an additional $500 million in federal aid—up from the $100 million it sought in the previous quarter. Freddie Mac also posted a $19.8 billion loss for all of 2010."

"The government rescued Freddie Mac and sibling company Fannie Mae in September 2008 to cover their losses on soured mortgage loans. It estimates the bailouts will cost taxpayers as much as $259 billion."

So who is responsible for this mess. A lot of people especially "Bailout" Barney Frank and a lot of other Democrats like Maxine Walters, Ralph Meeks, and others "roll the videotape":


But, above it all there is the audacity of Barney Frank:

GM = Government Motors

"NEW YORK, March 30 -- After ousting General Motors' chief executive, President Obama warned Monday that bankruptcy may be unavoidable for two American automotive giants. -WASHINGTON POST

Senator Bob Corker I think has it right

"This is a marked departure from the past, truly breathtaking, and should send a chill through all Americans who believe in free enterprise," Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.), who sits on the Senate Banking Committee, said in a statement. "Firing Rick Wagoner is a sideshow to distract us from the fact that the administration has no progress to announce today."

Benneto Mussolini is smiling in Hell!

A TAXPAYERS'S CRAP SANDWICH

Tim Geithner is expected to announce today the Obama administration's Taxpayer's crap sandwich where we will taxpayers be buying up the "bad assets" aka failed sub prime loans that the banks gave out because of their greed and activist's groups like ACORN pushed because of their social agenda. Of course President Obama did not mention the latter part of the problem on his 60 minutes appearance last night.

Capitol shock over AIG bonuses

Barack Obama and others is hopping mad over $167 million dollars in bonuses that are to be paid to employees of AIG. Like the famous scene from Casablanca he and other pols in Washington are shocked that there is greed in the financial industry. He has instructed his "gelt" boy to try and stop it. My advice is don't hold your breath waiting for this.

"President Obama's apparent inability to block executive bonuses at insurance giant AIG has dealt a sharp blow to his young administration and is threatening to derail both public and congressional support for his ambitious political agenda. "-Washington Post

The question many of us taxpayers are asking is why is AIG still around as a company? Why was it not forced into bankruptcy? Could it be that pols like Nancy Pelosi and John Kerry who own stock in AIG still have a chance of gettting some of their money out as long as we taxpayers keep the company on life support using taxpayers dollars?

OBAMA'S FORECLOSURE FOLLIES! OUR TAX DOLLARS!

Hello fellow sucker taxpayers! Remember Stanley Johnson?



Well President Obama is going to help him and millions of others using about 75 billion of our taxpayer dollars to bailout the lenders and borrowers who made and got loans that should have never been made in the first place. And guess who is going to help pay for this foreclosure bailout plan. Yes you and me the responsible tax payers!

Here is what President Obama said:
" We have launched a housing plan that will help responsible families facing the threat of foreclosure lower their monthly payments and refinance their mortgages. It's a plan that won't help speculators or that neighbor down the street who bought a house he could never hope to afford."

Oh yeah Mr. President? The Associated Press has Ben Bernanke telling us something completly different:

"AP, Feb. 25: Defending the program Tuesday at a Senate hearing, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said it's important to save those who made bad calls, for the greater good. He likened it to calling the fire department to put out a blaze caused by someone smoking in bed. "I think the smart way to deal with a situation like that is to put out the fire, save him from his own consequences of his own action but then, going forward, enact penalties and set tougher rules about smoking in bed."

No Mr. Bernanke the person who is smoking in bed deserves to get burned. You don't just toss the cigarette to us taxpayers who just happen to live next door and think everything will be fine.

Then there is this ends justify the means rational from Sheila Bair:

"I think it's just simply impractical to try to do a forensic analysis of each and every one of these delinquent loans," she told NPR.

Wait a minute! You don't think it's practical to look at these loans. Isn't that how the banks got into this mess in the first place? But, there's more to this idiotic logic.

And, Bair added, it's in the "collective economic interest" to not have more foreclosed homes on the market. "To try to punish all of those parties now by foreclosing on more homes, putting more families on the street, putting more houses onto the inventory, creating more downward pressure on home prices when you have so much inventory on the market right now. Is that in our collective economic interest to do that? I just don't think that it is."

That's the problem with people like this in the Obama administration they don't think! While foreclosure is certainly bad for the reckless borrowers and the banks who gave out the loans. Having us responsible taxpayers bail this bad behavior is not the answer. Let the foreclosures happen and then there will be opportunities for more responsible people to get into these homes. People like:

Lynn Powers, 39, a Bethesda, Md., resident who describes herself as a “liberal Democrat” who has been hardworking, prudent and responsible — and now feels “like a fool."“We were in the market,” she says. “We put out eight bids and got outbid every time. It was very upsetting for us. I want to see some accountability and responsibility across the board. The only way for me to have an affordable home, and I’m not looking for a McMansion at all, is if we let the chips fall, in a sense. This is still the bubble — the prices have to come down. You can’t just subsidize some of the people. I don’t know how you deleverage. It is going to be painful, but this is also hurting the people who behaved responsibly.”
What does she mean by “responsibly”?

“People who didn’t overbuy. Who stuck to their guns. Who read their contracts,” she says. She and her husband wound up buying a 600-square-foot studio and moved to a rental when they had their daughter, now 18 months old.

“My husband and I paid for our cars in cash,” she says. “We have no credit card debt. We have no student loans. I don’t buy Starbucks, but that’s because they’re non-fair trade, nonenvironmental.”

When they tried to buy a house, she said, “We just felt outgunned.” And now, she says, “I feel very outgunned as a citizen.”

And she should feel out gunned. Her government is subsidizing the people who out bid her on some of those houses. Now when she and her husband might be able to grab a foreclosed property at a reasonable price the Obama administration is rigging the market. This chart from a TIME magazine article shows what has been happening due to the foreclosures.

The chart shows home prices approaching a more normal average so that responsible people like Lynn Powers and her husband can get another shot at being a homeowner. But, Obama's plan is to stop the foreclosures and so keep house prices artificially high.

I think this woman from Maryland pretty much sums up the feeling of many of us responsible taxpayers to Obama's misguided plan:

“I am an Obama supporter, campaigned for him, baked cookies for him; my husband and I are Democrats all the way, but this is the issue that gets our goat.”
Echoing Santelli’s complaint, a Silver Spring, Md., mom who did not want her name used adds: “I’m not sure why we should work and pay for someone else to have a granite countertop or an extra bathroom.” When asked about people who hadn’t overreached but had lost their down-?payment money when the value of their homes had dropped, she replies, “We put money in a 401(k), and we lost that money, and no one is going to give it back.”-Politico

Foreclosure Follies

As President Obama tries to move his $275 billion dollar foreclosure plan of robbing Peter to bailout Paul plan forward. His radical activist friends at ACORN are already taken the law into their own hands breaking into foreclosed houses like burglars and thieves. Michelle Malkin has the money quotes and the real "documented" story:

But a closer look at ACORN’s sob stories shows that the prototypical foreclosure “victims” by the Left don’t deserve an ounce of sympathy – or a cent of our money.
Earlier this week, ACORN activists broke into a foreclosed home in Baltimore. With a mob cheering and camera crew taping, ACORN leader Louis Beverly busted a padlock and jimmied the door open at 315 South Ellwood Ave. The home once belonged to restaurant worker Donna Hanks, who assailed her evil bank for raising her mortgage by $300 and leaving her on the street.
“This is our house now,” Beverly declared with Hanks by his side at the break-in. What ACORN didn’t tell you: Hanks’ house was sold in June 2008 for $192,000. She bought the two-story home in the summer of 2001 for $87,000. At some point during the next five years, she re-financed the original home loan for $270,000. Where did all that money go? (Hint: Think house-sized ATM.)
Baltimore ACORN leader Louis Beverly, who also claims to be a foreclosure victim himself, was charged with burglary for the break-in and released. He is literally a housing thug – having been charged with separate second-degree assault and property destruction charges earlier this year and battery, assault, handgun possession and possession of a deadly weapon with intent to injure in 1992; and slapped with a peace order issued against him in 2006.

Remember Obama and others talking about how foreclosed homes are the real problem. Well this foreclosed home that ACORN thugs broke into had already been sold and so was no longer part of the problem. It seems ACORN is part of the real problem with there criminal tactics.

Quote of the Day

I'm on the Long Island Railroad the other day heading as part of my commute to the BCP Washington bureau. I overhear a fellow talking to his friend with a lilting Caribbean accent about women who are calling him claiming that his brother made them pregnant. He's telling them why are you calling me? I did not make you pregnant! Exasperated he tells his companion:

"My life is good but, my family makes it a mess!"

It's kind of the way I feel about whats going on with Washington some days!

Christmas Greetings from AIG and the Federal Reserve

This time of year is particularly a dangerous time for us taxpayers. It is a time when those in Washington can slip out bad news but, chances are less people will notice it. The reason for this is because everyone is running around for the Christmas holidays. Even most of the media empties out of this town for the next week or so. Not me. I am looking for the bad news leaked out. I think I found it in today's Washington Post. It concerns AIG and how it was able to get some of those nasty credit default swaps off it's books. Here are the money quotes:"American International Group retired $16 billion in credit default swaps, the contracts that almost caused the company's collapse, after buying the underlying securities with help from the Federal Reserve."

"The fund created by the Fed and AIG to protect the insurer's customers from losses has now purchased collateralized debt obligations with a face value of about $62.1 billion, the firm said in a statement."

"The business guaranteed more than $70 billion in securities created by pools of different kinds of debt, including sub prime mortgages, that plunged in value. The federal government committed $150 billion to bail out AIG and prevent losses at investment banks that bought protection on fixed-income securities from the insurer."

Whoa! AIG only guaranteed $70 billion in securities. But, we taxpayers gave them $85 billion and then another $65 billion in loans? What wrong with this picture?

Thanksgiving

Well there may be some things to be thankful for this Thanksgiving Day.

1)That John (Juan) McCain is not President.

2) That Obama seems to be taking a more centrist position in setting up his administration.

3) That things may be improving in the housing market according to a story in today's Washington Post:

Would-be mortgage borrowers have rushed to refinance their loans and even weighed plans to buy homes following the government's move this week to loosen consumer lending.
With interest rates suddenly plummeting, "the phone is ringing, the e-mails keep coming," said Jennifer Du Plessis, a mortgage adviser at Prosperity Mortgage, the lending arm of Long & Foster. "Real estate agents are hovering outside our office saying: 'I've got another client who wants to refinance.' "

Now if we can only keep Congress and whatever administration from doing something stupid like buying up "toxic assets" aka sub prime loans with good taxpayer money we may actually be seeing light at the end of the tunnel in this economic downturn. This is certainly something to be thankful for.

Song for Citibank with the Paulson Subprime singers

From today's Washington Post:


"The Treasury Department, Federal Reserve and Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. announced just before midnight Monday that they will protect Citigroup, one of the nation's largest banks, against potential losses on a $306 billion pool of troubled assets. "


How are we to account for this turn of events? The answer is in this video.

Idiot bankers and us sucker taxpayers

I was on the Amtrak heading down to Washington D.C. last night when I opened up the Financial Times weekend edition. They had a front page story of retiring Andrew Lahde of the hedge fund Lahde Capital. He was one of the few money managers to have correctly predicted the sub prime crisis. One of his funds made a return of 870 per cent last year. In his farewell letter to his investors he talks about the elite “aristocracy” and the "idiot bankers" who were on the other side of his bets. You know the same ones we middle class taxpayers will be bailing out to the tune of a trillion dollars thanks to the lame brains in like my Congressman Tim Bishop and others. Here are some of the money quotes:

"Saying he was “in this game for the money”, Mr Lahde went on to mock those who traded with him.
“The low-hanging fruit, ie idiots whose parents paid for prep school, Yale and then the Harvard MBA, was there for the taking.”
“These people who were (often) truly not worthy of the education they received (or supposedly received) rose to the top of companies such as AIG, Bear Stearns and Lehman Brothers and all levels of our government.
“All of this behaviour supporting the aristocracy only ended up making it easier for me to find people stupid enough to take the other side of my trades. God bless America.”

Thank you Mr Laude for confirming what I suspected all along.

BAILOUT: The taxpayer view

Congress and the bailout: Bad hand or bad idea?

I've got Nancy (the putz) Pelosi's words ringing in my head after she and the other sheep in Congress railroaded through the 900 billion dollar bailout pork bill. She said that the were dealt a "bad hand" like the members of Congress were at a casino. Yep, she and my Congressman Tim Bishop and Senators Clinton and Schumer were gambling alright. With our money! What was the result of their roll of the dice? Today's Washington Post has the money quotes:

"Last week, the nation's political leaders said the financial system would collapse unless they passed a $700 billion rescue package for Wall Street. On Monday, the first day of trading after the plan passed, the financial system continued to melt down anyway. "

The American people told congress that this was a bad idea they did not listen.

I was robbed

I had this dream on Friday night. The banks made these sub prime loans to people who could never afford a mortgage. Then President Bush, Nancy Pelosi, Barney Frank, my Congressman Tim Bishop, Senator Chuck Schumer, Hillary Clinton and a bunch of other politcians showed up. They went into my wallet and made me and other taxpayers pay the banks back for the subprime loans that they gave out.. Did anyone else have this dream? Thank God nothing like that could never actually happen in the American capitalist system.

Bank, bailouts, extortion and the Senate

Well Wall Street and the banks seem to be using extortion to try and get Congress to have U.S. taxpayers buy up their crap sub prime loans. In the Senate it looks like their lobbyists may have succeeded in getting dumbocrats like Chris Dodd to railroad this through. Meanwhile the banks are using extortion to make the situation worse. By tightening credit the are making the situation worse on purpose/ Nobody is actually asking the question that these banks can not keep up this extortion for long because they are in business to lend money. That's why they are trying to rush Congress to pass this bailout bill before people realize the game they are playing. If they get away with it it will be the biggest rip off the U.S. taxpayers.

Bailout failure: They call it Democracy!

"A bipartisan rebellion in the House killed a $700 billion rescue plan for the nation's financial system yesterday, "- Washington Post

Funny how the Post like some of the polititans in Washington is calling this a "rescue" when the American people overwelmingly know this is a bailout of the idiots of Wall Street. Speaking of idiots. How about that Nancy Pelosi? here are some of the money quotes:

"The Democratic side more than lived up to its side of the bargain," said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). "

Bargain my ass! Creating legislation to spend $700 billion of taxpayer money is not a bargain this was a bailout of Wall Street. The American people know it and they let their representatives know it in know uncertain terms.


"What happened today cannot stand," Pelosi said. "We must move forward, and I hope that the markets will take that message."


What can not stand ,Nancy? The will of the American people? Who flooded the offices of their Representatives with calls that this plan sucked? They call it Democracy for better or worse you and everyone else in Washington had better remember that!

BAILOUT: Hola suckers!

Nancy Pelosi said "The Party is over." but, for some the party has just begun. Nowhere in this trillion dollar bailout bill do I see that those sub prime homeowners who will be helped and bailout along with the banks have to prove that they are in this country illegally. Michelle Malkin

pulls back the curtain to show the 800 pound Gorilla sitting in the room where this bailout scam was negotiated here are the money quotes that will cost the American taxpayers:

It’s no coincidence that most of the areas hardest hit by the
foreclosure wave – Loudon County, Virginia, California’s Inland Empire,
Stockton, San Joaquin Valley, Las Vegas, and Phoenix, for starters — also happen
to be some of the nation’s largest illegal alien sanctuaries. Half of the
mortgages to Hispanics are subprime (the accursed species of loan to borrowers
with the shadiest credit histories.

I’ve reported on the rapidly expanding illegal alien home loan racket.
The top banks clamoring for their handouts as their profits plummet, led by
Wachovia and Bank of America, launched aggressive campaigns to woo illegal alien homebuyers. The quasi-governmental Wisconsin Housing and Economic Development Authority jumped in to guarantee home loans to illegal immigrants.

The Washington Post noted, almost as an afterthought in a 2005 report:
“Hispanics, the nation’s fastest-growing major ethnic or racial group, have been
courted aggressively by real estate agents, mortgage brokers and programs for
first-time buyers that offer help with closing costs. Ads proclaim: “Sin
verificacion de ingresos ! Sin verificacion de documento !” — which loosely translates as, ‘Income tax forms are not required, nor are immigration papers.’”

Yes, Nancy Pelosi had it right "The Party is over. But, for groups like La Raza and the illegal immigrants and banks who have these sub prime loans the party has just begun. Meanwhile we American taxpayers are the ones who will be left to clean up the mess thanks to this bailout bill. Hola suckers!

Wall Street is selling it's sh$t! Guess who is buying it?

From today's Washington Post:

Congressional leaders and the Bush administration this morning said they
had struck an accord to insert the government deeply into the nation's financial
markets, agreeing to spend up to $700 billion to relieve Wall Street of troubled
assets backed by faltering home mortgages.

Yes Wall Street is selling it's sh$t and we tax payers are buying it! Hello suckers!

Full details of the plan were not immediately available.

That's because the devil was busy looking at it and try to find a way to climb into it.

There was at least one good piece of news the Republicans seemed to have been able to get the Democrats to drop their demand that suspect "social services" groups like A.C.O.R.N don't get hold of any taxpayer money since their record of corruption and voter registration fraud is one of the under reported scandals in this whole mess. Here is the money quote:

They also agreed not to dedicate a portion of any profits from the bailout
program to an affordable housing fund that Republicans claimed would primarily
assist social service organizations that support the Democratic Party, the
official said

Only time will tell how badly we taxpayers are being screwed by this legislation and those who negotiated it want this passed before the opening bell of Wall Street. So it looks like our time is up!

Bailout Barney Frank to the rescue! Of who?

As the saying goes "Fools rush in where wise men never go" so it was the Democrats and Bush administration officals like Henry Paulson who tried to rush this Wall Street bailout plan cooked up by the banks themselves through Congress this week. Now comes this irritating comment from Bailout Barney Frank in today's Washington Post:

"I am convinced that by Sunday we will have an agreement people will understand." -Barney Frank

Oh we understand Congressman Frank. We understand we taxpayers are about to be screwed by a bailout orchestrated by the banks and financial institutions like Bank of America to save their butts because of the bad sub prime loans THEY made.

No Boo Hoos for WAMU!

As the Washington Post reports:

"Federal regulators last night seized the massive, troubled mortgage lender Washington Mutual in the largest bank failure in U.S. history,"

J.P. Morgan submitted the highest bid in an auction regulators held Wednesday night, buying Washington Mutual's 2,200 branches, its $135 billion in remaining deposits -- and its vast portfolio of troubled investments in mortgage-related securities.

My my how could this have happened? As Diggers Realm reported a while ago here is an example of the kind of sub prime mortgage that Washington Mutual gave out:

"Soledad Aviles, an immigrant from Mexico with a 6th grade education who can't read or write English and makes $9 an hour, was approved for a mortgage of $615, 000 by Washington Mutual. It should be noted off the bat that Washington Mutual is one of many banks that accept the Matricula Consular ID card as proof of identity and which is easily forgable."

"Referred to a local loan broker by a trusted friend, he borrowed the entire purchase price of $615,000 from Washington Mutual at a high interest rate typical of sub-prime loans. The monthly payment, as he says he understood it, would be $3,600 -- steep for a glass cutter who made $9 an hour"-

Gee, What could go wrong here? Meanwhile Congress and the mainstream media continues to ignore exactly who these banks like Washington Mutual were giving mortgages to and why we should not be surprised how things turned out and why these banks deserve to fail and not a penny of taxpayers money should be spent to save them.