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« Reply #1 on: September 19, 2018, 03:48:18 PM » |
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The Patriot Post Digest 9-19-2018
From The Federalist Patriot
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In 2005, the House Financial Services Committee chairman, Democrat Rep. Barney Frank, dismissed what he called an “excessive degree of concern” by Republicans regarding the growing housing bubble, declaring he wanted to “roll the dice a little bit more in this situation27.” Other Democrats, including Sen. Chuck Schumer and Rep. Maxine Waters, vehemently argued against reining in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac’s reckless lending policies.
Even Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez would have been able to figure out what would happen next.
Lending institutions began writing sub-prime loans in bulk. Investment banks bought up these loans and packaged them as Residential Mortgage-Backed Securities, and sold them to investors. This drove a massive boom in the housing market, driving up prices far above the homes’ actual value, stoked by easy money policies.
This created a domino effect driving risky speculation, and eventually the bubble burst — with devastating results. Lehman Brothers, one of the nation’s largest financial institutions, went bankrupt. Firms like Merrill Lynch and AIG, as well as GSEs Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, required hundreds of billions of dollars in taxpayer bailouts to remain afloat.
Almost overnight, tens of millions of Americans discovered their homes were worth a fraction of what they paid for them, and their retirement portfolios had been devastated. No longer able to afford their mortgages, and unable to come close to breaking even if they sold their homes, many Americans simply walked away.
In the aftermath, the architects of the disastrous financial crisis28 were, unbelievably, placed in charge of the recovery process. Tim “Turbo Tax” Geithner, president of the New York Fed from 2003-2009, became Barack Obama’s Treasury secretary. Rep. Barney Frank, whose previous dice-rolling played a direct role in the financial meltdown, co-wrote the Dodd-Frank financial regulatory reform bill that, in direct contradiction to Democrat claims, actually made “too big to fail” bailouts a matter of law29.
In retrospect (and, as many conservatives at the time argued), it’s obvious the bailouts simply prolonged the suffering. Rather than allowing these institutions to go through managed bankruptcies and suffer the consequences of their reckless, extremely risky investment decisions, the taxpayers, who bore no responsibility, nevertheless were forced to take a massive hit to their wallets to bail out these politically connected banks and investment firms.
Even more infuriating is the fact that these bailed-out banks — including CitiGroup, Bank of America, and Merrill Lynch — paid out more than $11 billion in bonuses30 in 2008, long before the dust cleared from the rubble that remained of the U.S. economy.
Obama eventually claimed taxpayers had not only been paid back, but that TARP (the Troubled Asset Relief Program, which bought up these toxic assets) had actually turned a profit for taxpayers. Unfortunately, that claim is nothing more than a rhetorical and accounting sleight of hand31.
Though millions of Americans never fully recovered32 from the financial disaster, some politicians and bank executives failed to learn the lessons of the meltdown and are returning to the policies that caused it in the first place.
Wells Fargo, still trying to regain the public trust following revelations that bank employees created millions of fraudulent checking and savings accounts on behalf of customers without their knowledge or consent, is wading back into the sewer of sub-prime mortgages33. Unbelievably, this announcement comes just weeks after Wells Fargo paid a $2 billion fine for its role in the 2008 financial crisis.
Despite the Justice Department’s report finding Wells Fargo urged its underwriters to “to take more chances, and be more aggressive, in approving loans that were outside of Wells Fargo’s underwriting guidelines,” CEO Tim Sloan is working with non-bank lenders to package sub-prime loans in “mass capacity” and sell to investors.
Comedian Will Rogers once quipped, “Good judgment comes from experience, and a lot of that comes from bad judgment.”
Apparently, we haven’t had enough experience yet33.
https://patriotpost.us/articles/58343-repeating-the-mistakes-of-the-2008-economic-crash
MORE ANALYSIS FROM THE PATRIOT POST
DeVos’s Free-Speech Promotion34 — The secretary of education makes important remarks about our Constitution and schools.
Clinton Accuses Trump of Her Own Faults35 — Her tone-deaf whining is a great example of why Trump’s in the White House and she’s not.
Bert & Ernie: A Case of Mistaken Puppet Love36 — A show writer insists he thought the pair was gay. The show and the puppet’s creator say he’s wrong.
Video: Trump Orders Secret Russia Docs Dump37 — Including the surveillance of Page, and text messages from Comey, McCabe, Strzok, Page, and Ohr.
OPINION IN BRIEF
Ben Shapiro: “Many on the left insist that the ‘believe all women’ standard be applied to accusers against those on the right but that the general credibility standard should be applied to their own favorites. That’s nonsensical, and insulting. What’s more, it deliberately undermines the bulwark of universal approval with which #MeToo should be met. We should all be able to agree that some standard beyond mere belief is required here — and we should all be willing to hear evidence that implicates our favorite political figures. But if we insist on applying a politically motivated double standard in the name of #MeToo, the support for #MeToo will crumble. That would be a tragedy, but it would also be a familiar tragedy. All too often, movements that should draw broad public support are undermined by fringe cases used as clubs by members of politically driven groups. We should all agree that any racist police shootings must be stopped — but such agreement falls apart when some insist that questionable shootings be treated as racist shootings. We should all agree that sexual abuse must be stopped — but such agreement disintegrates when some insist that unsubstantiated sexual abuse allegations be treated just like substantiated allegations. Politics should not be allowed to override basic human decency. Yet again, that’s what’s happening.”
SHORT CUTS
Non Compos Mentis I: “We just can’t go back to [the pre-Roe era]. That’s unconscionable to me. And also — I’m sure that this will unleash another wave of hate in my direction — but as a deeply religious person, it’s also unchristian to me.” —Chelsea Clinton
Non Compos Mentis II: “We need to judge Brett Kavanaugh not just by what he may or may not have done but how he treats a woman’s pain.” —Wonkette founder Ana Marie Cox (“The real question of the Duke lacrosse case, by this standard, wasn’t whether a stripper was actually raped — the question is whether the members of the Duke lacrosse team were sensitive to her feelings while she was falsely accusing them of rape.” —Ben Shapiro)
What due process? “Enough with the ‘he said, she said’ storyline. If this is he said, she said, then let’s believe the ‘she’ in these scenarios. She has nothing to gain, and everything to lose. For 250 years we have believed the ‘he’ in these scenarios. Enough is enough.” —ABC News’s Matthew Dowd
Guilty until proven innocent: “For a woman to come forward in the glaring lights of focus, nationally, you’ve got to start off with the presumption that at least the essence of what she’s talking about is real, whether or not she forgets facts, whether or not it’s been made worse or better over time.” —Joe Biden
Hypocrite: “Supreme Court justices should not be an extension of the Republican Party.” —Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), who wants the Supreme Court to be an extension of the Democrat (read: “Living Constitution”) Party
Braying Jackass I: “[Trump] really is the rare combination of an eight-year-old boy — he’s got the maturity of an eight-year-old boy with the insecurity of a teenage girl.” —John Kerry (Ironically, Kerry’s comrades weren’t amused … because sexism!38)
Braying Jackass II: “Barack and I agreed we would be quiet for the first year to let the new administration get up and running. God forgive me.” —Joe Biden
And last… “Hello, FBI? We need you to investigate a sexual assault allegation? Oh, that’s a police matter? Still. When was it? Roughly 36 years ago? The actual date? No idea. The location? Not sure. What do we know? There were either 2 or 4 people in the room. Hello, hello? Did you hang up?” —John Hawkins
https://patriotpost.us/articles/58324-wednesday-short-cuts
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Semper Vigilans Fortis Paratus et Fidelis
Nate Jackson, Managing Editor
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