Barney Frank Lies Through His Teeth

We as a country are doomed. This is one of the most powerful men in government. Barney Frank was the leader in getting Fannie and Freddie to lend to sub prime borrowers. Now he lies through his teeth in an incoherent interview.  There is video I published on this blog of him in Congressional hearings berating Bush Administration officials for trying to limit loans to people who could not pay, now he mumbles about it being Bush's fault. We are in big trouble folks, there is no accountability just lies by those in charge. I'm on vacation in Europe but I will did up the video of him telling the Bush Administration that they have to lend more to lower income borrowers.-Lou

Barney Frank: Don't Blame Me for the Housing Bubble

Who’s to blame for the subprime housing bubble? A popular answer – especially on the right side of the aisle - is Massachusetts Democrat, Barney Frank. 

Why?

The argument, best summed up in an Investor's Business Daily editorial published in March 2009, goes like this:  "Starting in the early 1990s," Rep. Barney Frank "(and other Democrats) stood athwart efforts by regulators, Congress and the White House to get the runaway housing market under control." It goes on to say in, "2002, Frank nixed reforms" of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and that in 2003, "led by Frank, Democrats stood as a bloc against any changes" that President Bush proposed making to Fannie and Freddie.

Is it true?  Frank doesn't think so.

Here are some of the main points the current Chairman of the House Financial Services Committee made to Tech Ticker's Aaron Task during their interview last week on Capitol Hill.

First, and it's a point Frank returned to several times, is he and the Democrats did not have the power to call the shots since they were in the minority during most of the Clinton and Bush years.  "Tom Delay was running the House of Representatives.  So I take responsibility for what I do but I don't take responsibility for Newt Gingrich and Tom Delay’s policies," he protests.  Making a broader point, he says, "if I really had the power to stop the Republicans from doing anything you know what I would have done first? 

 I would have stopped the war in Iraq.  I would have stopped the impeachment of Bill Clinton. I would have stopped tax breaks for people making millions of dollars a year."

More