by Sigrid Weidenweber
8. November 2011 10:08
“Sig, here is another article for your blog,” wrote my friend David and attached an article by Peter J. Wallison from the WSJ. I do not believe that many of you have the time to read the Wall Street Journal for two hours each morning the way I do. Therefore, a monumental amount of very important information about the economy, the politics and the cultural changes in our country is lost to you. I will try to sum-up many of the topics and try to present them in condensed form. Perhaps those of you with some spare time in the evening, and an interest in the country will be able to follow along.
Peter Wallis postulates in his opinion piece that the protesters in their tent enclaves have been sold a bill of goods. Now we all know that the Thesaurus defines a bill of goods as deception, misrepresentation, falsehood and deceit. So, what would make Mr. Wallis say something so strong and accusatory? It is simply the fact that he, and many others, believe that the government was responsible for the housing crisis that brought on our economic downturn.
Instead of protesting Wall Street, he thinks it would be more appropriate to put up tent in front of the White House or the House of Congress. It was the Dodd-Frank Act that allowed Fanny Mae and Freddy Mac to lend money to people who had neither down-payment for a house, nor did they have the means to later make the monthly payments on their loans.
Now let us be quite clear, this feat of pushing the housing market over the brink, accomplished through the flawed Department of Housing and Urban Development, an agency with a long-time reputation of mismanagement, was the piece the resistance served up by the Bill Clinton and the George W. Bush administrations.
In conclusion let me say that anyone who lost their house should protest HUD and the offices of Mr. Dodd and Frank. It was their brain-child and they should be fully credited with the results. That is not to say that there were not plenty other suspects involved in the crisis—and yes, Wall Street was in on it too. In my opinion like a kid discovering an open candy-jar.
Mr. Wallison is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. He was also a member of theFinancial Crisis Inquiry Commission and dissented from the majority's report.
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