Alcyone, thank you very much for your information. Of course it makes perfect sense that the Democrats wouldn't be blameless. A crisis this large must percolate for a while to really burst open, and that alone guarantees that some of its roots must be found in the Clinton era.
Anyway, I think that the very idea that mortgages must be given to poor people is in itself a sprout from a Reaganomic tree trunk. It starts from the idea that private ownership is always the best thing and should be fought for by politicians, and it differs from standard Republican thinking by insisting that poor people, too, should be able to own their own house. The Democrats tried to use the idea of private (home)ownership and make it work for poor people too, which I find commendable. On the other hand, one of the things I have tried to say in this debate is that the Democrats have taken over many Republican ideas. Instead of asking themselves how society can be improved if a little more collectivism is used and a few more taxes are raised, they asked themselves how privatization could work for the poor, too.
I thought that the Newsweek article (or opinon-piece or whatever) that you gave us a link to was excellent. It is so easy to blame the poor, when it was really the big loan sharks that turned bad loans into supposed assets and sold them to others as assets, who in turn sold them on to others at a profit, making the whole economy rest on clay feet.
I appreciate how that Newsweek article points out that the law that the Democrats pushed through didn't force anyone to act recklessly when giving out mortgages. Those who did act recklessly did it because they could make a profit that way.
Another great thing about that Newsweek article is that it points out that poor people usually pay back their loans, assuming that the rent they have to pay doesn't suddenly rise shaply. In Swedish newspapers, that has been described as an important reason for the crisis: a lot of people were forced to default on their subprime loans, because the interest rate suddenly rose so much. Anyway, again according to Newsweek, it is usually the rich people that play fast and loose with their money. And not only with their own money, but with other people's money as well.
Roger criticized Factcheck for not delving into the filibuster issue. To me, that is what I find so puzzling in the first place, that the Democrats should threaten the Republicans with a filibuster if they didn't drop McCain's reform of Fannie Mae. From my Swedish horizon, I have gotten the impression that filibusters happen extremely rarely, but it is also uncommon that the minority party can force the majority to drop a bill by threatening a filibuster. That is why I think that if the Democrats really did that on this occasion, their move must have raised more than a few eyebrows, and there should be ample records of this rare occurrence. In other words, it should be comparatively easy to find if a filibuster was threatened, and it should also be easy to find records where the Democrats explain why they took this rare step.
Roger, you are the one who insists that there was a threat of a filibuster. Please point me to one video or one written source where this can be verified. If at all possible, please point me to a source where the Democrats explain their reasons for their filibuster threat.
Let me add one more thing. It seems to me that many Republicans insist that the crisis is almost all about Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. That seems to be a very partisan position to me.
Ann
