Was Clinton responsible for the Financial Crisis?

The basis for the argument is that in 1992, Congress that Fannie and Freddie increase their purchases of mortgages for low-income and medium-income borrowers (I believe through a 20 year old law called the Community Reinvestment Act). Operating under that requirement, Fannie Mae, in particular, was more aggressive and creative in stimulating minority gains. It aimed extensive advertising campaigns at minorities that explain how to buy a home and opened three dozen local offices to encourage lenders to serve these markets. Most importantly, Fannie Mae agreed to buy more loans with very low down payments–or with mortgage payments that represent an unusually high percentage of a buyer’s income. That made banks willing to lend to lower-income families they once might have rejected.

Since HUD became their regulator in 1992, Fannie and Freddie each year are supposed to buy a portion of “affordable” mortgages made to underserved borrowers. Every four years, HUD reviews the goals to adapt to market changes.

In 1995, President Bill Clinton’s HUD agreed to let Fannie and Freddie get affordable-housing credit for buying subprime securities that included loans to low-income borrowers. The idea was that subprime lending benefited many borrowers who did not qualify for conventional loans. HUD expected that Freddie and Fannie would impose their high lending standards on subprime lenders.

Banks typically back prime loans with customers’ deposits. But subprime lenders often rely on money from Wall Street investors , who buy packages of loans as investments called mortgage-backed securities.


In 2000, as HUD revisited its affordable-housing goals, the housing market had shifted. With escalating home prices, subprime loans were more popular. Consumer advocates warned that lenders were trapping borrowers with low “teaser” interest rates and ignoring borrowers’ qualifications.

HUD restricted Freddie and Fannie, saying it would not credit them for loans they purchased that had abusively high costs or that were granted without regard to the borrower’s ability to repay. Freddie and Fannie adopted policies not to buy some high-cost loans.

That year, Freddie bought $18.6 billion in subprime loans; Fannie did not disclose its number.

In 2001, HUD researchers warned of high foreclosure rates among subprime loans.

“Given the very high concentration of these loans in low-income and African American neighborhoods, the growth in subprime lending and resulting very high levels of foreclosure is a real cause for concern,” an agency report said.

But by 2004, when HUD next revised the goals, Freddie and Fannie’s purchases of subprime-backed securities had risen tenfold. Foreclosure rates also were rising.

That year, President Bush’s HUD ratcheted up the main affordable-housing goal over the next four years, from 50 percent to 56 percent. John C. Weicher, then an assistant HUD secretary, said the institutions lagged behind even the private market and “must do more.”

In 2003, the two bought $81 billion in subprime securities. In 2004, they purchased $175 billion — 44 percent of the market. In 2005, they bought $169 billion, or 33 percent. In 2006, they cut back to $90 billion, or 20 percent. Generally, Freddie purchased more than Fannie and relied more heavily on the securities to meet goals. Because Fannie and Freddie were buying mortgage-backed securities rather than the actual subprime loans, their involvement came too late to require stiffer standards from lenders.

Neither they nor HUD had the staff or ability to look through all those loans to determine whether they met the lending guidelines of Fannie and Freddie even though their money was used to capitalize them.

It was a mistake to credit Fannie and Freddie for investing in subprime securities toward their affordable housing goals. That’s on the Clinton administration in a general, theoretical way. But it was under Bush when the practice began to threaten the economy in a very real way and it was allowed to continue and even encouraged. It was also a mistake to expand the program after 2000 and that is all on Bush’s HUD crew. However, there was a large push among individual, mostly Democratic members of Congress in 2004, the last time the HUD strategies were revisited (prior to this year) but to blame them (or the CBC) for the problems when they had so little power seems a bit of a stretch.


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28 responses to “Was Clinton responsible for the Financial Crisis?”

  1. Zaid Avatar
    Zaid

    Yeah, I think corrupt folks like Clinton and Rubin had some responsibility but I think that video needs to stop being shown as some kind of enlightening device.

  2. djmelfi Avatar

    A must watch video: Democrats in their own words Covering up the Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac Scam that caused our Economic Crisis http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_MGT_cSi7Rs

  3. J.M. Prince Avatar

    Robert’s Stochastic thoughts, Blog Post for Wednesday, September 17, 2008: With Pic of what was going on @ Ground Zero while some were trying to blame Clinton for Bush’s criminal intent: ‘Cutting Red Tape’ Meant NO Effective Regulation.

    [http://rjwaldmann.blogspot.com/2008/09/kid-bitzer-commenting-over-at-edge-of.html]

    “Actually, there was plenty of coordination ‚Äî a coordinated effort to destroy effective regulation:

    Consider the press conference held on June 3, 2003 — just about the time subprime lending was starting to go wild — to announce a new initiative aimed at reducing the regulatory burden on banks. Representatives of four of the five government agencies responsible for financial supervision used tree shears to attack a stack of paper representing bank regulations. The fifth representative, James Gilleran of the Office of Thrift Supervision, wielded a chainsaw.

    The lack of oversight, in short, was no oversight: it was part of the plan.”

    Not a Bug or a Mistake. A Feature. The Plan.

    Cheers, JMP

  4. RuralDem Avatar
    RuralDem

    “Partisan hackery like I said before is a stain on our nation.”

    It’s easy to say that when you’re affiliated with the Green Party or some other crazy third party.

    Are you backing McKinney?

  5. J.M. Prince Avatar

    Clearly then you can’t read either Z. Or can’t be bothered to. Again, a true mark of a Trot argument.

    They’re all guilty of something, right? That’s always the central premise of any Inquisition. You’ve yet to tell us How repealing Glass-Stegall Created this ‘Hell’. Or describe the actions that were the necessary conditions for the current crisis. I have. That’s not ‘partisan hackery’, it’s an effective argument. It’s that simple.

    You don’t have the facts, the knowledge, or reality on your side. So all you’ve got is name calling and Clinton hating. I’m sorry, that’s really not enough for a real argument. It’s partisan hackery in & of itself, even if you probably imagine that you’re ‘post partisan’ too. Despite all evidence to the contrary.

    I say Glass-Stegall was Besides the point. It did next to nothing to cause the current crisis. It was a ‘firebreak’ that was unneeded if there was the proper maintenance of any sort of financial regulatory regime. By Either the States OR the Feds & DoJ. That the Bush’s (&McSame) saw to it to dismantle and render inoperable ASAP in 2000. And They Knew exactly what they were doing. That’s Criminal, and the FBI is investigating the fraud as we speak on Wall St. (Too late to save much, BTW).

    You you’ll never ‘get’ this as you’re too wrapped up in simple name calling and score settling. There was plenty about the Clinton admin I did not like, did not support, and did not appreciate. Still, given the record? He was & remains one of the best, if not the best presidents of the Post war era. Bar none. You will hold resentments against them due to the fact that their economic team dared to include people who actually knew a bit about real economics, and were successful at it. On Wall St. Not everyone on the Street is evil, and I’m not exactly a fan of many of them. Just those who want us to pay for their idiotic bad bets.

    But again, all this is dross. You simply don’t understand it, and you’ve made absolutely no indication so far of doing so. So I can argue with the birds with better results. Most after all are melodious & tuneful and can do more than one call. Can you? Mark me Doubtful here. Cheers, JMP

  6. Zaid Avatar
    Zaid

    I don’t disagree with most of the blame you put on Bush, but your defense of Clinton is getting to be very far-fetched in that you won’t admit the slightest guilt on him or the 90 Senators or the shameless Robert Rubin who sent Glass-Steagall to Hell (and Wall Street with it).

    Partisan hackery like I said before is a stain on our nation.

  7. J.M. Prince Avatar

    This is what I’m talking about. Facts, useful, ugly and dangerous things. Wholly unknown to some but still acting on their lives nevertheless.

    From Wash Post Editorial, by Elliot Spitzer, 2/13/08; The Other Ground Zero for the Crime of the Century:

    “Predatory Lenders’ Partner in Crime

    How the Bush Administration Stopped the States From Stepping In to Help Consumers

    By Eliot Spitzer

    Thursday, February 14, 2008; A25

    Several years ago, state attorneys general and others involved in consumer protection began to notice a marked increase in a range of predatory lending practices by mortgage lenders. Some were misrepresenting the terms of loans, making loans without regard to consumers’ ability to repay, making loans with deceptive “teaser” rates that later ballooned astronomically, packing loans with undisclosed charges and fees, or even paying illegal kickbacks. These and other practices, we noticed, were having a devastating effect on home buyers. In addition, the widespread nature of these practices, if left unchecked, threatened our financial markets.

    Even though predatory lending was becoming a national problem, the Bush administration looked the other way and did nothing to protect American homeowners. In fact, the government chose instead to align itself with the banks that were victimizing consumers.

    Predatory lending was widely understood to present a looming national crisis. This threat was so clear that as New York attorney general, I joined with colleagues in the other 49 states in attempting to fill the void left by the federal government. Individually, and together, state attorneys general of both parties brought litigation or entered into settlements with many subprime lenders that were engaged in predatory lending practices. Several state legislatures, including New York’s, enacted laws aimed at curbing such practices.

    What did the Bush administration do in response? Did it reverse course and decide to take action to halt this burgeoning scourge? As Americans are now painfully aware, with hundreds of thousands of homeowners facing foreclosure and our markets reeling, the answer is a resounding no.

    Not only did the Bush administration do nothing to protect consumers, it embarked on an aggressive and unprecedented campaign to prevent states from protecting their residents from the very problems to which the federal government was turning a blind eye.

    Let me explain: The administration accomplished this feat through an obscure federal agency called the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC). The OCC has been in existence since the Civil War. Its mission is to ensure the fiscal soundness of national banks. For 140 years, the OCC examined the books of national banks to make sure they were balanced, an important but uncontroversial function. But a few years ago, for the first time in its history, the OCC was used as a tool against consumers.

    In 2003, during the height of the predatory lending crisis, the OCC invoked a clause from the 1863 National Bank Act to issue formal opinions preempting all state predatory lending laws, thereby rendering them inoperative. The OCC also promulgated new rules that prevented states from enforcing any of their own consumer protection laws against national banks. The federal government’s actions were so egregious and so unprecedented that all 50 state attorneys general, and all 50 state banking superintendents, actively fought the new rules.

    But the unanimous opposition of the 50 states did not deter, or even slow, the Bush administration in its goal of protecting the banks. In fact, when my office opened an investigation of possible discrimination in mortgage lending by a number of banks, the OCC filed a federal lawsuit to stop the investigation.

    Throughout our battles with the OCC and the banks, the mantra of the banks and their defenders was that efforts to curb predatory lending would deny access to credit to the very consumers the states were trying to protect. But the curbs we sought on predatory and unfair lending would have in no way jeopardized access to the legitimate credit market for appropriately priced loans. Instead, they would have stopped the scourge of predatory lending practices that have resulted in countless thousands of consumers losing their homes and put our economy in a precarious position.

    When history tells the story of the subprime lending crisis and recounts its devastating effects on the lives of so many innocent homeowners, the Bush administration will not be judged favorably. The tale is still unfolding, but when the dust settles, it will be judged as a willing accomplice to the lenders who went to any lengths in their quest for profits. So willing, in fact, that it used the power of the federal government in an unprecedented assault on state legislatures, as well as on state attorneys general and anyone else on the side of consumers.

    The writer (was) governor of New York at the time.”

    Cheers, JMP

  8. J.M. Prince Avatar

    This is getting amusing. Almost.

    This was the Full quote of mine Z:

    “Again, clearly you are Concern Trolling. As a Repug. (or Worse) this is your entertainment. It’s not mine. I don’t waste my time with concern trolls”.

    And Yes, I said ‘Or worse’. So you want to avoid or Lie about that too? You’ve refuted None of my claims. You’ve countered or discussed none of your underlying premises since stating them. Ergo, Your ‘discourse’ and responses are typically Trotsyite, because that’s all you are seemingly capable of understanding. ‘I’ll just assert this, and so it will be!’ Your argument is unsupportable, so you’ve not made any attempt to bolster it. Get back to us with how effective that might be anywhere. But yeah. I’m wasting my time with another Knownothing.

    Cheers, JMP

  9. Zaid Avatar
    Zaid

    Oh, and I know that Republicans certainly are HUGE fans of Byron Dorgan, Maxine Waters, and Paul Wellstone, Democrats I praised for their foresight in opposing this horrible legislation.

    Knee-jerk partisan reactions are part of what’s destroying the discourse in this country and I expected better out of you prince.

  10. Zaid Avatar
    Zaid

    And good to see RuralDem, who doesn’t seem to actually want to partake in the economics or legislative discussion, jump in with ad hominem and character assassination of his own. This isn’t talk radio, you have to make a discussion here.

  11. Zaid Avatar
    Zaid

    Again, clearly you are Concern Trolling. As a Repug. ”

    So those who make accurate criticisms, repeatedly refute the claims you’re making, and force to revert to crude ad hominem are Republicans, huh?

    My, you’re certainly going to lose the unloseable election with those tactics.

  12. RuralDem Avatar
    RuralDem

    J.M. Prince,

    Just to clarify, Zaid is actually with the Green Party. Don’t let him fool you, I’ve actually spoken with some UGA people that know him.

    He comes on here just to troll, nothing more.

  13. J.M. Prince Avatar

    Well Z, Again you give your game away here:

    “To continue, you’re not going to convince anyone to vote for you or your party by playing a game of Democrats=angels Republicans=demons.”

    Again, clearly you are Concern Trolling. As a Repug. (or Worse) this is your entertainment. It’s not mine. I don’t waste my time with concern trolls.

    And you give yourself away with your dripping contempt here:

    “And just one more highlight from the article, one of the highest Democratic operatives praising the evisceration of our regulatory regime” and then go on to quote Treasury Secretary Larry Summers.

    Again, not just a mere ‘operative’. The Treasury Secretary. A Cabinet post.

    And again you fail to support your premise that this was a ‘bipartisan disaster’. What were the Mechanisms here? Can you describe them? How did this work? What happened in the intervening Decade to (finally?) drive the system down?

    You’ve got a little bit of meat from an old carcass. And like a hyena you know that you’ve got this small bit of meat that you’ve torn away. And it’s Your By Goodness!

    I already said that the way they repealed Glass-Steagall was unfortunate. I disagreed with it at the time. Nothing in the Original Bill would have caused the banking collapse we are seeing now. And I’ve quoted about a half dozen economic experts who’ve said that. You?

    You’ve resorted to the typical Repug Concern Trolling for your own entertainment purposes, and of course Always using ad hominem as the first line of attack.

    So again nothing in the original bill would have caused this debacle. Taking the cops off the beat will. Every time. And that’s why it now looks a whole lot like the Great Depression. Where even eventually the Hooverites had to admit that Yes, they screwed the country.

    Providing us with decade old quotes won’t save you here Z. Knowing the reality of what happened might, but I’m betting that you’d still blame the Dems for Bush’s regulatory failures. Look up Elliot Spitzer. Days Before the hooker scandal. In an editorial he wrote for the Washington Post. He knew it was coming. The Bush’s knew too, and knew enough to know they Desperately had to hide their crimes from the public. They Deliberately Refused to reign in the subprime crisis, even before it got too serious. Refused to Let States regulate securities, as they have for decades. They even Sued in the USSC and lost, and now Our country is lost too.

    So again, Glass-Steagall? Just about Besides the point. It’s like looking at the My Lai Massacre and trying to convict the helicopter pilot.

    So yeah. Democrats disagree. Take that home with you and frame it, along with Yet Another Repug. Great Depression. That’s the take away message here. Cheers, JMP

  14. Zaid Avatar
    Zaid

    And just one more highlight from the article, one of the highest Democratic operatives praising the evisceration of our regulatory regime:

    ”Today Congress voted to update the rules that have governed financial services since the Great Depression and replace them with a system for the 21st century,” Treasury Secretary Lawrence H. Summers said. ”This historic legislation will better enable American companies to compete in the new economy.””

  15. Zaid Avatar
    Zaid

    Second of all, you seem to forgive Robert Rubin for endlessly shilling for ending the Glass-Steagall regulations then immediately fleeing his post as soon as it was repealed and taking up a job at Citigroup which then underwent a series of mergers that would’ve been illegal before.

    This was a shameless selling out of our country.

    Senator Bob Kerrey, another Democrat, also attacked Paul Wellstone and others who criticized the evisceration of the Glass-Steagall firewall by saying that “‘The concerns that we will have a meltdown like 1929 are dramatically overblown.” As we tabulate 700 billion dollars to bail out several banks and the mortgage giants, does he still think that?

    You should read this, because you seem to think that this was an evil Republican plot and not one that was greased with lobbyist dollars to both parties:

    http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C03E2DB1F3BF936A35752C1A96F958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all

    We had brave champions like Wellstone and Dorgan and Waters fighting this, but the greedy bastards like Kerrey, Gramm, Rubin, and Clinton won this round.

  16. Zaid Avatar
    Zaid

    I didn’t “lay all the blame at the feet of the Dems,” I said both made major errors, that’s why I called it a bipartisan disaster.

    I notice you didn’t admit you were wrong about the vote. I wonder why?

    To continue, you’re not going to convince anyone to vote for you or your party by playing a game of Democrats=angels Republicans=demons. That’s called being a partisan hack and the people are very much angry at that approach, as the extremely low approval ratings of both President Bush and the Democratic Congress show.

  17. J.M. Prince Avatar

    Some of the pieces to the puzzle here:

    and here from Bloomberg:

    [http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=aT.Q3P5imhVg&refer=home].

    You’ll note that the Clinton’s appear in neither of the main scenarios here.

    And 8 years on, why are you so quick to lay Blame at the feet of the Dems? That’s my question here. Bipartisan my ass! Cheers, JMP

  18. J.M. Prince Avatar

    Some of the pieces to the puzzle here:

    [http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=ah839IWTLP9s&refer=home] and here from Bloomberg:

    [http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=aT.Q3P5imhVg&refer=home].

    You’ll note that the Clinton’s appear in neither of the main scenarios here.

    And 8 years on, why are you so quick to lay Blame at the feet of the Dems? That’s my question here. Bipartisan my ass! Cheers, JMP

  19. J.M. Prince Avatar

    [Well my prior comment was too lengthy perhaps or contained too many references, and so is being held for moderation. As these never are seen to see the light of day again, I’ll try to restate this w/o some of the ref.]

    Yes, lovely there. Again Z, you forget the premise of your argument, get lost in your own accusations, and then demand that others do you the favor of your own research.

    So again let’s set it up. Premise: ‘This was a ‘Bipartisan disaster’ that Clinton would have been responsible for in part. Even Time magazine says it did not happen that way. Again:

    [http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1841981,00.html].

    It was the regulators Called Off their beat, that enabled some of the Greatest Financial Crimes to be ever committed on the public. Who was responsible for this? Again a 35 year ideological & sustained policy assault on ALL regulation dating from the Reagan administration. During the Dubya admin. this devolved to historic depths, where the regulators were actually yes, in Bed & sleeping with the corporations and lobbyists who they were supposed to be regulating.

    So No it was not the laws, imperfectly drawn up that was the immediate cause of the crisis. It was the Lack of regulation & regulators to actually police the law & the firms involved. Without that crucial bit of Epic but very deliberate & planned Failure, we’d be still afloat.

    And the wiki you cite (I suspect the date’s wrong) was the switched job that Sen. Phil Gramm smuggled into the bill at the 11th hour, During the succession crisis of the Bush v Gore debacle, with Congress roiling and the country fixated on whether the Constitution would prevail. Alas it did not and would face some of the most vicious wholesale assaults on it’s legitimacy and the wholesale attacks on the Rule of Law in our nation’s history. Given this, policing the financial sector was instantly demoted in John Ashcroft’s DoJ priority list to ‘non existent’ Behind doing stings on hookers. You could look that up too. Sept. 9th, 2001 is the date in question here.

    So again what do the economic Pro’s say? Bloomberg says Pish Posh to the premise: [Ref Below]

    So again. A very complex mess that at it’s base is fairly simple. Massive Fraud. Systemic Corruption. Thieving Criminality. Monumental Greed. Unprecedented Mendacity.

    We can describe it for you in more painful detail as needed too.

    But again NO, the Clinton administration had Very little to do with this. And in most real senses it is Not a ‘bipartisan mess’. It’s Another Great Depression, brought to you by the same party that brought you the First on in the 1929-30’s. Cheers, JMP

  20. J.M. Prince Avatar

    Yes, lovely there. Again Z, you forget the premise of your argument, get lost in your own accusations, and then demand that others do you the favor of your own research.

    So again let’s set it up. Premise: ‘This was a ‘Bipartisan disaster’ that Clinton would have been responsible for in part. Even Time magazine says it did not happen that way. Again:

    [http://www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1841981,00.html].

    It was the regulators Called Off their beat, that enabled some of the Greatest Financial Crimes to be ever committed on the public. Who was responsible for this? Again a 35 year ideological & sustained policy assault on ALL regulation dating from the Reagan administration. During the Dubya admin. this devolved to historic depths, where the regulators were actually yes, in Bed & sleeping with the corporations and lobbyists who they were supposed to be regulating.

    So No it was not the laws, imperfectly drawn up that was the immediate cause of the crisis. It was the Lack of regulation & regulators to actually police the law & the firms involved. Without that crucial bit of Epic but very deliberate & planned Failure, we’d be still afloat.

    And the wiki you cite (I suspect the date’s wrong) was the switched job that Sen. Phil Gramm smuggled into the bill at the 11th hour, During the succession crisis of the Bush v Gore debacle, with Congress roiling and the country fixated on whether the Constitution would prevail. Alas it did not and would face some of the most vicious wholesale assaults on it’s legitimacy and the wholesale attacks on the Rule of Law in our nation’s history. Given this, policing the financial sector was instantly demoted in John Ashcroft’s DoJ priority list to ‘non existent’ Behind doing stings on hookers. You could look that up too. Sept. 9th, 2001 is the date in question here.

    So again what do the economic Pro’s say? Bloomberg says Pish Posh to the premise: Here: [http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=aT.Q3P5imhVg&refer=home] and here:

    [http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=ah839IWTLP9s&refer=home].

    So again. A very complex mess that at it’s base is fairly simple. Massive Fraud. Systemic Corruption. Thieving Criminality. Monumental Greed. Unprecedented Mendacity.

    We can describe it for you in more painful detail as needed too.

    But again NO, the Clinton administration had Very little to do with this. And in most real senses it is Not a ‘bipartisan mess’. It’s Another Great Depression, another collapse of global capitalism brought to you by the same party that brought you the First on in the 1929-30’s. Cheers, JMP

  21. innerredneckexposed Avatar

    Did Zaid just ask people not to resort to ad hominem

  22. Zaid Avatar
    Zaid

    And please do not resort to ad hominem, it does not fit your usual high caliber of posting.

  23. Zaid Avatar
    Zaid

    JM Prince, you’re one of the most intelligent bloggers I’ve ever seen, but you’re wrong on this one. The vote you’re referring to was the initial vote for it before it went to Conference. The final version of the bill passed 90-8, 7 Democrats Against, 1 GOP Against, McCain not voting (convenient).

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glass-Steagall_Act

    “The final bipartisan bill resolving the differences was passed in the Senate 90-8-1 and in the House: 362-57-15. Without forcing a veto vote, this bipartisan, veto proof legislation was signed into law by President Bill Clinton on November 12, 1999.”

    Biden supported it, just like he backed the horrible bankruptcy bill, because Delaware credit and banking industries wanted him to.

  24. J.M. Prince Avatar

    September 22, 2008

    It Wasn’t Fannie and Freddie

    It’s time to run this again, and add a bit more to it:

    Did Fannie and Freddie cause the mortgage crisis?, by Jim Hamilton: Some thoughts about the role played by the GSEs in the run-up in mortgage debt and house prices. …

    Cheers, JMP

    [http://economistsview.typepad.com/economistsview/2008/09/it-wasnt-fannie.html]

  25. J.M. Prince Avatar

    Umm No 90 Votes either Z. It was a really bad idea, and it was & still is a deeply flawed dearly Repug idea. The votes were nearly party line: I count only 1 Dem vote for it here:

    Senate Vote On Passage: S. 900 [106th]: Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act

    [http://www.govtrack.us/congress/vote.xpd?vote=s1999-105&sort=vote].

    And again, not one of Clinton’s stellar moments. And one reason why we can be yes, thankful that Obama has a clear field of fire on this one. He. Was. Not. Involved. Neither were Most Dems, BTW. Cheers, JMP

  26. J.M. Prince Avatar

    Zaid, as usual you’re full of it. Here’s the vid:

    [http://tpmtv.talkingpointsmemo.com/2008/09/tpmtv_blame_game.php]

    Glass Steagall was a Very small part of this mess. It COULD NOT HAVE HAPPENED WITHOUT MANY, MANY OTHER ENABLING CONDITIONS. Principal among these was a 35 years of implementing Repug ideology of Deregulation. It starts in the 1980’s. The Keating Five scandal of the mid 1980’s is Ground Zero for the current crisis. McSame was in that up to his neck, he only escaped charges by being ‘charming’ and using the ever reliable ‘Noun, Verb, Pow story’. Over & over again. And apologizing profusely & abjectly. That he does well, but only after the crime.

    So if you want to argue the finer Economic points of the issue, I can and will. But this ‘bipartisan BS’ is a Repug. ruse. And at better than 2:1 even the great unwashed public rejects it. So take your ‘concern trolling’ elsewhere, right? Cheers, JMP

  27. Zaid Avatar
    Zaid

    Glass Steagall was eviscerated by the votes of 90 Senators and the signature of the bill by Bill Clinton and the treasury secretary who quickly left his work to go work for newly merged Citigroup.

    So you can say this was a bipartisan disaster, but not for the reasons listed in the above blog.

  28. J.M. Prince Avatar

    The answer is that No, the Clinton admin & the Dems were not responsible for this ongoing debacle. More at links. I’ll add some later too. Cheers, JMP

    [http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/archives/2008/09/blame_the_cra.php]

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