Journalist @baltimoresun writer artist runner #amwriting Chaplain PIO #partylikeajournalist

Journalist @baltimoresun writer artist runner #amwriting Chaplain PIO #partylikeajournalist
Journalist @baltimoresun writer artist runner #amwriting Md Troopers Assoc #20 & Westminster Md Fire Dept Chaplain PIO #partylikeajournalist
Showing posts with label Bus Econ Freddie Mac. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bus Econ Freddie Mac. Show all posts

Tuesday, December 20, 2011

The American: Cleaning House: The Financial Crisis and the GSEs By Edward Pinto



TUESDAY, DECEMBER 20, 2011
TODAY'S FEATURE
By Edward Pinto
Disclosures contained in SEC complaints show the need for further investigation of Fannie and Freddie's characterization of subprime loans.
Read More
THE ENTERPRISE BLOG
A terrifying appraisal of Greece
By James Pethokoukis
DATAPOINTS
Throwing FDR under the Bus?
By Steve Conover
Good as Gold?
By John Steele Gordon
Immigration as Economic Renewal
By Madeline Zavodny
Why Unemployment Is Worse Than You Think
By Ike Brannon and Matt Thoman
The Class Warfare We Need
By Steve Conover
American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research
1150 Seventeenth Street, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20036
P: 202.862.5800 F: 202.862.7177 www.aei.org


*****

Monday, March 30, 2009

Rahm Emanuel's profitable stint at mortgage giant


It seems that Tribune reporters Bob Secter and Andrew Zajac, have written a lengthy and comprehensive article that certainly does not portray President Barack Obama’s chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel in a very positive light in reference to part of the heart of our current economic malaise…

Not only did he enrich himself from the bad loaning practices of Freddie Mas but, “What is less known, however, is how little he apparently did for his money and how he benefited from the kind of cozy ties between Washington and Wall Street that have fueled the nation's current economic mess.

Even for those of us who have become jaded and disillusioned with the byzantine machinations of Washington, will find much of the following information unbelievable… / Kevin Dayhoff

chicagotribune.com: Rahm Emanuel's profitable stint at mortgage giant

Short Freddie Mac stay made him at least $320,000

By Bob Secter and Andrew Zajac, Tribune reporters, 3:18 PM CDT, March 26, 2009 (1682 words)

Before its portfolio of bad loans helped trigger the current housing crisis, mortgage giant Freddie Mac was the focus of a major accounting scandal that led to a management shake-up, huge fines and scalding condemnation of passive directors by a top federal regulator.

One of those allegedly asleep-at-the-switch board members was Chicago's Rahm Emanuel—now chief of staff to President
Barack Obama—who made at least $320,000 for a 14-month stint at Freddie Mac that required little effort.

As gatekeeper to Obama, Emanuel now plays a critical role in addressing the nation's mortgage woes and fulfilling the administration's pledge to impose responsibility on the financial world.

Emanuel's Freddie Mac involvement has been a prominent point on his political résumé, and his healthy payday from the firm has been no secret either. What is less known, however, is how little he apparently did for his money and how he benefited from the kind of cozy ties between Washington and Wall Street that have fueled the nation's current economic mess.

Though just 49, Emanuel is a veteran Democratic strategist and fundraiser who served three terms in the U.S. House after helping elect Mayor Richard Daley and former President Bill Clinton. The Freddie Mac money was a small piece of the $16 million he made in a three-year interlude as an investment banker a decade ago.

In business as in politics, Emanuel has cultivated an aggressive, take-charge reputation that made him rich and propelled his rise to the front of the national stage. But buried deep in corporate and government documents on the Freddie Mac scandal is a little-known and very different story involving Emanuel.

He was named to the Freddie Mac board in February 2000 by Clinton, whom Emanuel had served as White House political director and vocal defender during the Whitewater and Monica Lewinsky scandals.

The board met no more than six times a year. Unlike most fellow directors, Emanuel was not assigned to any of the board's working committees, according to company proxy statements. Immediately upon joining the board, Emanuel and other new directors qualified for $380,000 in stock and options plus a $20,000 annual fee, records indicate.

[…]

The board was throttled for its acquiescence to the accounting manipulation in a 2003 report by Armando Falcon Jr., head of a federal oversight agency for Freddie Mac. The scandal forced Freddie Mac to restate $5 billion in earnings and pay $585 million in fines and legal settlements. It also foreshadowed even harder times at the firm.

[…]

Former President George W. Bush voluntarily stopped making such appointments following Falcon's assessment of their uselessness.

[…]

The Obama administration rejected a Tribune request under the Freedom of Information Act to review Freddie Mac board minutes and correspondence during Emanuel's time as a director. The documents, obtained by Falcon for his investigation, were "commercial information" exempt from disclosure, according to a lawyer for the Federal Housing Finance Agency.

[…]

By the time Emanuel joined Freddie Mac, the company had begun to loosen lending standards and buy riskier sub-prime loans. It was a practice that later blew up and contributed to the current foreclosure crisis.

[...]


Read the entire lengthy article here: Rahm Emanuel's profitable stint at mortgage giant. But don’t do it on a full stomach…

20090326 ChicagoTrib Rahm Emanuel profitable stint at mortgage giant

www.chicagotribune.com/news/politics/obama/chi-rahm-emanuel-profit-26-mar26,0,5682373.story

Kevin Dayhoff www.kevindayhoff.net http://kevindayhoff.blogspot.com/

Thursday, March 26, 2009

TimesWatch Tracker: Our Latest Analysis Thursday, March 26, 2009




TimesWatch Tracker: Our Latest Analysis Thursday, March 26, 2009

TimesWatch Tracker Documenting and Exposing the Liberal Agenda of the New York Times

Amazing Omissions in Times Interview of Barney Frank
A Times writer manages to talk to Barney Frank about Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and an SNL skit without bringing up a single challenging question.

Free-Market Radical From Czech Republic "Embarrasses" EU Again
Once again, the Times chides a Czech Republic leader's infuriating embrace of free-market principles.

Striving to Paint a More Positive Picture of a Cop-Killer
Lovelle Mixon killed four Oakland police officers -- but was he also a victim of the California penal system?

Amazing Omissions in Times Interview of Barney Frank

http://www.timeswatch.org/articles/2009/20090326153108.aspx

A Times writer manages to talk to Barney Frank about Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and an SNL skit without bringing up a single challenging question.

Posted by: Clay Waters 3/26/2009 3:40:56 PM

The Times' special Deal Book section on Thursday featured a Q&A with Rep. Barney Frank by Times contributing writer Cyrus Sanati, "
Rep. Barney Frank's To-Do List for Changing Wall Street."

“Wall Street is bracing for a regulatory tsunami to make its way up from Washington. Lawmakers are considering sweeping changes to the Depression-era securities laws and regulatory agencies that failed to prevent the economic downturn.

“As these new proposals gain momentum, Representative Barney Frank, the Massachusetts Democrat who is chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, will have a central role in influencing the size and scope of these new regulations.”

That's the lead-in to an extremely friendly interview (described as "edited and condensed excerpts from the discussion") with the liberal Democrat Frank, who heads up the House Financial Services Committee and will have a hand in creating new regulations and laws on executive compensation.

Not one of Sanati's 10 questions were critical of Frank, and none delved into his controversial ties and strong defense in the past of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government-sponsored mortgage lending companies, in their quest to ease up requirements for mortgage loans in the name of "affordable housing," which many experts think contributed to the mortgage crisis.

Sanati even asked Frank a question about Fannie and Freddie, but ignored Frank's previous support of the entities, captured by the Times itself in September 2003. At a hearing, Frank lectured that "these two entities, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, are not facing any kind of financial crisis....The more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing."

Oops.

But Sanati ignored all that and painted Franks as some kind of Freddie and Fannie reformer:

“Sanati: Subprime mortgages played a large part in the downturn, as well as the need for the government to rescue the mortgage financing giants Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. In an op-ed in the Financial Times in 2007, you said, “The subprime crisis demonstrates the serious negative economic and social consequences that result from too little regulation.” What have you done since to tighten regulation of that market?”

In Frank's answer, Sanati let the congressman get away with passing the buck to the Bush administration:

“Frank: We passed shortly thereafter a bill that would prevent the type of subprime mortgages that went bad. Unfortunately, it never passed the Senate. I am returning to that now. Earlier in 2007 we passed legislation to improve the regulation of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, but the Senate didn’t get on to passing it until July 2008 and by that time it was too late. The problem was with George Bush in power. It was hard to get the approval we needed for the degree of regulation that we thought was necessary.”

Saturday Night Live mocked Frank in a skit that aired on the network on the night of October 4, 2008, putting some blame on Frank for the banking crisis, The official online version of the skit was later controversially http://pajamasmedia.com/rogerlsimon/2008/10/07/nbc-reactionaries-ban-inconvenient-snl-sketch/ redacted by NBC in a way that removed all mention of Frank. Bizarrely, Sanati talks about a Frank' impression on SNL -- but another one, one featuring a Frank impressionist chairing the Big 3 auto hearings, which aired on November 22, 2008 and didn't attract nearly as much attention as the banking skit.

“Sanati: Many Americans have been following your committee’s hearings -- so much so that even “Saturday Night Live” did a skit about them, featuring you grilling the Big Three automakers. How do you think they did in impersonating you?”

“Frank: I am impressed with Fred Armisen’s range given that he impersonates me and Barack Obama, so I guess that’s, um, sort of interesting. The only time I was upset was when they had someone doing me that was really fat.”


20090326 TimesWatch Tracker for March 26 2009


Kevin Dayhoff www.kevindayhoff.net http://kevindayhoff.blogspot.com/