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From the page: "When President Bill Clinton took office, Fannie and Freddie were viewed as "key" to Clinton's plans to expand home ownership. The Washington Post reports: "The result was a period of unrestrained growth for the companies... The companies increasingly were... more
Reviewed by ayntryte Sep 20 2008, 08:09am ( 1 review ) • therealitycheck.org
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Rated by ayntryte on Sep 20 2008, 8:09am
From the page: "When President Bill Clinton took office, Fannie and Freddie were viewed as "key" to Clinton's plans to expand home ownership. The Washington Post reports: "The result was a period of unrestrained growth for the companies... The companies increasingly were seen as the engine of the housing boom." As Fannie and Freddie grew, conservatives repeatedly warned that their size posed a systemic risk to the financial system. As Sarah Palin put it, thanks to the implicit federal guarantee of their debt, Fannie and Freddie had become too big and too expensive to the taxpayers. But Fannie and Freddie did not want to be exposed so they turned to Democrat friends for protection. James Johnson who was an advisor to Walter Mondale and is now a campaign advisor to Barack Obama, fought all efforts to reform of Freddie and Fannie. Clinton administration OMB director Franklin Raines joined the effort and tried to reassure critics that when he was Fannie Mae CEO in 1999: "We manage(d) our political risk with the same intensity that we manage our credit and interest rate risks." To this day Fannie and Freddie's lobbying power over Democrats continues to be strong and it's no secret why that is the case. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, the top three recipients of campaign donations from Freddie and Fannie's PACs and employees are all Democrats. From 1989 through today, Sen. Chris Dodd received $165,400, Barack Obama $126,349, and John Kerry $111,000. The Washington Post in their article concluded: "Blessed with the advantages of a government agency and a private company at the same time, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac used their windfall profits to co-opt the politicians who were supposed to control them."
