Frankin Raines? The Clinton budget director appointed as CEO of Fannie Mae who changed Fannie Mae from a boring business of — issuing debt to buy mortgages from lenders — into a far more risky one?
Timothy Howard? Former Fannie Mae CFO who overstated the company’s earnings by .6 billion from 1998 to 2004?
Barney Frank? House Financial Services Committee chairman has long been a proponent of both Fannie and Freddie, assuring the public that their mission to encourage home ownership outweighed the distortive risks they brought to the market?
Angelo Mozilo? Few, if any, extracted more personal profit from the credit bubble than the CEO and founder of Countrywide Financial. Mozilo’s talking points always borrowed heavily from the propaganda of the changed Fannie & Freddie, pretending that it was performing some kind of public service — "breaking down barriers" — by making homes more "affordable" to the sub average wage earner.
Alan Greenspan? who many blame for the housing bubble, and supposed to be providing the country with a financial voice of reason, who fell so far short, that it might be comical if it weren’t so tragic?
John McCain?, who saw the problems with Fannie and Freddie and and sponsored a bill that could have regulated them in 2005, but was politically unable to get it out of the demotratic controlled Senate Finance committee?
Dodd, Obama, and the other Senators who took huge sums of money from Fannie and Freddie? who vigorously defended them even after their accounting scandals in 2004?
The financial institutions? who purchased these incredibly complex financial products from Fannie and Freddie with out fully understanding the risks?
The people that that bought houses they clearly couldn’t afford? The ones who didn’t bother to take 3 minutes with a calculator?
To be sure, there were many more complicit in this mess. Who do you blame?
>
> The next time you hear a politician use the
> word ‘billion’ in a casual manner, think about
> whether you want the ‘politicians’ spending
> YOUR tax money.
>
> A billion is a difficult number to comprehend,
> but one advertising agency did a good job of
> putting that figure into some perspective in
> one of it’s releases.
>
> A.
> A billion seconds ago it was 1959.
>
> B.
> A billion minutes ago Jesus was alive.
>
> C.
> A billion hours ago our ancestors were
> living in the Stone Age.
>
> D.
> A billion days ago no-one walked on the earth on two feet.
>
> E.
> A billion dollars ago was only
> 8 hours and 20 minutes,
> at the rate our government
> is spending it.
>
> While this thought is still fresh in our brain…
> let’s take a look at New Orleans ..
> It’s amazing what you can learn with some simple
> division.
>
> Louisiana Senator,
> Mary Landrieu (D)
> is presently asking Congress for
> 250 BILLION DOLLARS
> to rebuild New Orleans . Interesting number…
> what does it mean?
>
> A.
> Well … if you are one of the 484,674 residents of New
> Orleans
> (every man, woman, and child)
> you each get $516,528.
>
> B.
> Or… if you have one of the 188,251 homes in
> New Orleans , your home gets $1,329,787.
>
> C.
> Or… if you are a family of four…
> your family gets $2,066,012.
>
> Washington , D. C
>
> HEL LO!
> Are all your calculators broken??
>
> Building Permit Tax
> CDL License Tax
> Cigarette Tax
> Corporate Income Tax
> Dog License Tax
> Federal Income Tax (Fed)
> Federal Unemployment Tax (FU TA)
> Fishing License Tax
> Food License Tax
> Fuel Permit Tax
> Gasoline Tax
> Hunting License Tax
> Inheritance Tax
> Inventory Tax
> IRS Interest Charges (tax on top of tax)
> IRS Penalties (tax on top of tax)
> Liquor Tax
> Luxury Tax
> Marriage License Tax
> Medicare Tax
> Property Tax
> Real Es tate Tax
> Service charge taxes
> Social Security Tax
> Road Usage Tax (Truckers)
> Sales Taxes
> Recreational Vehicle Tax
> School Tax
> State Income Tax
> State Unemployment Tax (SUTA)
> Telephone Federal Excise Tax
> Telephone Federal Universal Service Fee Tax
> Telephone Federal, State and Local Surcharge Tax
> Telephone Minimum Usage Surcharge Tax
> Telephone Recurring and Non-recurring Charges Tax
> Telephone State and Local Tax
> Telephone Usage Charge Tax
> Utility Tax
> Vehicle License Registration T ax
> Vehicle Sales Tax
> Watercraft Registration Tax
> Well Permit Tax
> Workers Compensation Tax
> (And to think, we left British Rule to avoid so many taxes)
>
>
> STILL THINK THIS IS FUNNY?
>
> Not one of these taxes existed 100 years ago…
> and our nation was the most prosperous in the world.
>
> We had absolutely no national debt…
> We had the largest middle class in the world…
> and Mom stayed home to raise the kids.
>
> What happened?
> Can you spell ‘politicians!’
>
> And I still have to
> press ’1′
> for English.
>
> I hope this goes around the
> U S A
> at least 100 times
>
> What the heck happened?????
A single person did not get us into this mess and a single person will not get us out …
All of the above; coupled with greed!
Who cares who’s to blame. Who’s going to step up and make things better that what I want to know.
good question and yes it does matter that we know the cause of this calamity, so it won’t happen again.
in my opinion, it wasn’t the last two that you listed (institutions/people who purchased houses)
it was the responsibility of the government’s "experts" who are responsible for keeping regulations and controls in check i.e. the budget director, greenspan (the fed), senators, these supposed "EXPERTS" i.e. lawyers, economists – who are brought in to do this work. That’s why they were elected to do their job, and they failed either because they were incompetent or grossly negligent or both. I think both.