The Blame Game

A lot of you Dems out there are blaming us Republicans for the financial mess we're currently in. All I hear is, "8 years of Republicans = economy sucks" or, "Bush is an f-----' idiot."


No matter how unconstructive those phrases are, let's take a walk down Pennsylvania Avenue circa 1999 when the Clinton Administration urged companies like Fannie Mae to ease credit restrictions on minorities and low-income families.


By Steven Holmes from the New York Times:

In a move that could help increase home ownership rates among minorities and low-income consumers, the Fannie Mae Corporation is easing the credit requirements on loans that it will purchase from banks and other lenders.

The action, which will begin as a pilot program involving 24 banks in 15 markets -- including the New York metropolitan region -- will encourage those banks to extend home mortgages to individuals whose credit is generally not good enough to qualify for conventional loans. Fannie Mae officials say they hope to make it a nationwide program by next spring.

Fannie Mae, the nation's biggest underwriter of home mortgages, has been under increasing pressure from the Clinton Administration to expand mortgage loans among low and moderate income people and felt pressure from stock holders to maintain its phenomenal growth in profits.

Now, while there's plenty of blame to go around, the above excerpt from 1999 proves to me that you Dems aren't completely innocent in all this. We ALL - both parties - have a responsibility to correct one hell of an economic mess.


With all this being said, the blame game needs to stop. I'm hopeful it stops tonight in the Senate when a new economic bailout deal is voted on.


ER


Full NYT Article: Fannie Mae Eases Credit To Aid Mortgage Lending