Article here at Townhall.com. (H/T ECM)
Excerpt:
After the cascade of economic disasters that began in the housing markets in 2006 and spread into the financial markets in Wall Street and even overseas, people in the private sector pulled back. Banks stopped making so many risky loans. Home buyers began buying homes they could afford, instead of going out on a limb with “creative”– and risky– financing schemes to buy homes that were beyond their means.
But politicians went directly in the opposite direction. In the name of “rescuing” the housing market, Congress passed laws enabling the Federal Housing Administration to insure more and bigger risky loans– loans where there is less than a 4 percent down payment.
A recent news story told of three young men who chipped in a total of $33,000 to buy a home in San Francisco that cost nearly a million dollars. Why would a bank lend that kind of money to them on such a small down payment? Because the loan was insured by the Federal Housing Administration.
The bank wasn’t taking any risk. If the three guys defaulted, the bank could always collect the money from the Federal Housing Administration. The only risk was to the taxpayers.
Does the Federal Housing Administration have unlimited money to bail out bad loans? Actually there have been so many defaults that the FHA’s own reserves have dropped below where they are supposed to be. But not to worry. There will always be taxpayers, not to mention future generations to pay off the national debt.
Very few people are likely to connect the dots back to those members of Congress who voted for bigger mortgage guarantees and bailouts by the FHA. So the Congressmen’s and the bureaucrats’ jobs are safe, even if millions of other people’s jobs are not.
Congressman Barney Frank is not about to cut back on risky mortgage loan guarantees by the FHA. He recently announced that he plans to introduce legislation to raise the limit on FHA loan guarantees even more.
Congressman Frank will make himself popular with people who get those loans and with banks that make these high-risk loans where they can pocket the profits and pass the risk on to the FHA.
So long as the taxpayers don’t understand that all this political generosity and compassion are at their expense, Barney Frank is an odds-on favorite to get re-elected. The man is not stupid.
Can you guess which political party Barney Frank represents?
WINTERY KNIGHT 