as a community organizer obama trained ACORN staff, ran leadership training seminars for ACORN leaders and funded ACORN

first off, it can’t be said any better than this:

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three facts everyone needs to know about the current financial crisis:

fact 1: obama supported acorn through staff and leadership training and through the funding of acorn by the wood’s fund and annenberg challenge. acorn has a rich history of intimidating banks to lower their credit standards and issue subprime loans to customers with poor credit, which is the cause of the world financial crisis we find ourselves in. also, as an attorney in 1994 obama was involved in a lawsuit against citibank to force it to make a bad loan, charging the bank was ‘discriminatory’.

fact 2: senator mccain did everything in his power in 2005 through the federal housing enterprise regulatory reform act of 2005 to both warn and legislate against the current subprime loan financial crisis

fact 3: the root of this whole mess is a) the clinton administration for putting teeth into the community reinvestment act where they both gave out and made popular subprime loans to people who had little ability to pay them back, and b) democrats who later repeatedly blocked regulation reform, including c) barack obama, who thought fannie mae and freddie mac buying subprime loans was a good idea as he thought they would distribute risk more broadly throughout american and world markets

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fact 1: obama supported acorn through staff and leadership training and through the funding of acorn by the wood’s fund and annenberg challenge. acorn has a rich history of intimidating banks to lower their credit standards and issue subprime loans to customers with poor credit, which is the cause of the world financial crisis we find ourselves in. also, as an attorney in 1994 obama was involved in a lawsuit against citibank to force it to make a bad loan, charging the bank was ‘discriminatory’.

acorn is known for it’s militant tactics of intimidation and disruption in forcing banks to issue subprime loans to uncreditworthy customers. when obama was a young community organizer, madeline talbott of chicago’s acorn had obama train her personal staff. he later did legal work for acorn in the illinois ‘motor voter’ case, led ‘project vote’ in 1992, ran leadership training seminars for acorn leaders, funded acorn though the wood’s fund which he supervised, and as leader of the chicago annenberg challenge he channeled more funds to madeline talbott and acorn. obama’s lack of knowledge and judgment in supporting acorn’s push to get banks to lower their credit standards actually contributed to the financial mess we find ourselves in.

stanley kurtz of the washington post in “o’s dangerous pals – barack’s ‘organizer’ buds pushed for bad mortgages” writes:

“when obama was just a budding community organizer in chicago, talbott was so impressed that she asked him to train her personal staff.

he returned to chicago in the early ’90s, just as talbott was starting her pressure campaign on local banks. chicago acorn sought out obama’s legal services for a “motor voter” case and partnered with him on his 1992 “project vote” registration drive.

in those years, he also conducted leadership-training seminars for acorn’s up-and-coming organizers. that is, obama was training the army of acorn organizers who participated in madeline talbott’s drive against chicago’s banks.

more than that, obama was funding them. as he rose to a leadership role at chicago’s woods fund, he became the most powerful voice on the foundation’s board for supporting acorn and other community organizers. in 1995, the woods fund substantially expanded its funding of community organizers – and obama chaired the committee that urged and managed the shift.

that committee’s report on strategies for funding groups like acorn features all the key names in obama’s organizer network. the report quotes talbott more than any other figure; sandra maxwell, talbott’s acorn ally in the bank battle, was also among the organizers consulted.

more, the obama-supervised woods fund report ac knowledges the problem of getting donors and foundations to contribute to radical groups like acorn – whose confrontational tactics often scare off even liberal donors and foundations.

indeed, the report brags about pulling the wool over the public’s eye. the woods fund’s claim to be ‘nonideological,’ it says, has “enabled the trustees to make grants to organizations that use confrontational tactics against the business and government ‘establishments’ without undue risk of being criticized for partisanship.”

hmm. radicalism disguised by a claim to be postideological. sound familiar?

the woods fund report makes it clear obama was fully aware of the intimidation tactics used by acorn’s madeline talbott in her pioneering efforts to force banks to suspend their usual credit standards. yet he supported talbott in every conceivable way. he trained her personal staff and other aspiring acorn leaders, he consulted with her extensively, and he arranged a major boost in foundation funding for her efforts.

and, as the leader of another charity, the chicago annenberg challenge, obama channeled more funding talbott’s way – ostensibly for education projects but surely supportive of acorn’s overall efforts.

in return, talbott proudly announced her support of obama’s first campaign for state senate, saying, ‘we accept and respect him as a kindred spirit, a fellow organizer.’

in short, to understand the roots of the subprime mortgage crisis, look to acorn’s madeline talbott. and to see how talbott was able to work her mischief, look to barack obama.

then you’ll truly know what community organizers do.”

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obama and ACORN have worked closely forcing banks into giving loans to those who cannot afford them, which led to our current economic disaster. bank intimidation is a primary goal of acorn and its members. what is obama’s goal?

while an attorney with the chicago law firm davis, miner, barnhill and galland, obama was part of a team of lawyers that sued citibank for practicing ‘redlining’ (loan discrimination) in the case ‘buycks-roberson v. citibank fed. sav. bank‘. they won and it essentially forced citibank to give a bad loan. this kind of loan practice is the root cause of the current financial crisis we find ourselves in. ACORN specializes in intimidating banks to give bad loans, abusively using the CRA (the community reinvestment act) to scare banks to comply. in a november 2007 meeting with ACORN, obama said: “i’ve been fighting alongside acorn on issues you care about my entire career. even before i was an elected official, when i ran project vote voter registration drive in illinois, acorn was smack dab in the middle of it, and we appreciate your work.“

obama on record: a lawsuit against citibank forcing it to give a bad loan .. the details:
»  learn more about barack obama and acorn
»  civil rights litigation clearinghouse – buycks-roberson v. citibank fed. sav. bank
»  barack obama was acorn’s attorney (a rare list of obama’s case history)
»  “obama represented calvin roberson in a 1994 lawsuit against citibank, charging the bank systematically denied mortgages to african-american applicants and others from minority neighborhoods.”
»  obama sued citibank under cra to force it to make bad loans – updated
»  google query: buycks-roberson v. citibank fed. sav. bank defendant’s history
»  google query: obama sued citibank
»  “even though barack obama is still denying his role and involvement with acorn and the root causes of the subprime mortgage crisis, the proof is in the pudding, as they say.”

ACORN history of intimidating banks to give bad loans .. the details:
»  planting seeds of disaster – acorn, barack obama, and the democratic party
»  o’s dangerous pals – barack’s ‘organizer’ buds pushed for bad mortgages
»  google query: acorn forces banks
»  obama – acorn root causes of mortgage crisis?
»  consumer rights league, obama, acorn and the subprime mortgage (updated)
»  obama, acorn, and the churches
»  human events search query: obama acorn
»  what does a community organizer do? pressure banks to make bad loans
»  a great example of how we got to the credit-market meltdown
»  why the mortgage crisis happened (a chronology of all key events)
»  how did the biggest financial scandal in history happen?

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fact 2: senator mccain did everything in his power in 2005 through the federal housing enterprise regulatory reform act of 2005 to both warn and legislate against the current subprime loan financial crisis

senator mccain’s effort to address what he foresaw as an impending financial crisis was set forth way back in 2005. it was introduced by sen. charles hagel [r-ne] and senator mccain was a co-sponsor of the bill. it was called:

“s. 190 [109th]: federal housing enterprise regulatory reform act of 2005 – a bill to address the regulation of secondary mortgage market enterprises, and for other purposes.“

it’s summarized on the govtrack.us site as follows:

1/26/2005–introduced.

federal housing enterprise regulatory reform act of 2005 – amends the federal housing enterprises financial safety and soundness act of 1992 to establish: (1) in lieu of the office of federal housing enterprise oversight of the department of housing and urban development (hud), an independent federal housing enterprise regulatory agency which shall have authority over the federal home loan bank finance corporation, the federal home loan banks, the federal national mortgage association (fannie mae), and the federal home loan mortgage corporation (freddie mac); and (2) the federal housing enterprise board.

sets forth operating, administrative, and regulatory provisions of the agency, including provisions respecting: (1) assessment authority; (2) authority to limit nonmission-related assets; (3) minimum and critical capital levels; (4) risk-based capital test; (5) capital classifications and undercapitalized enterprises; (6) enforcement actions and penalties; (7) golden parachutes; and (8) reporting.

amends the federal home loan bank act to establish the federal home loan bank finance corporation. transfers the functions of the office of finance of the federal home loan banks to such corporation.

excludes the federal home loan banks from certain securities reporting requirements.

abolishes the federal housing finance board.

compare the two camps now on the issue of the economy. senator obama actually sued banks because they were not giving away enough subprime loans, while senator mccain foresaw a financial crisis based on out of control subprime lending and did something about it. who is ready to lead? are you still going to listen to obama rhetoric?

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fact 3: the root of this whole mess is a) the clinton administration for putting teeth into the community reinvestment act where they both gave out and made popular subprime loans to people who had little ability to pay them back, and b) democrats who later repeatedly blocked regulation reform, including c) barack obama, who thought fannie mae and freddie mac buying subprime loans was a good idea as he thought they would distribute risk more broadly throughout american and world markets

it’s all here documented in this transcript of a short video report by brit hume of fox news:

brit hume, host: in the recent spate of government bailouts, buyouts and rescues, the federal takeovers of mortgage giants fannie mae and freddie mac are arguably the biggest of them all. and those two firms are also arguably the biggest reason for the credit crisis in the first place. so the question arises — how did this come to be? chief washington correspondent jim angle reports.

(begin videotape)

jim angle, chief washington correspondent (voice-over): there is one nagging question behind all the debate over how to get out of this mess.

chris dodd (d-ct), senate banking committee chmn: american taxpayers are angry and they demand to know how we arrived at this moment.

elizabeth dole (r), north carolina senator: my constituents, and indeed taxpayers across the nation are asking how we arrived at this crisis. it is infuriating.

angle: but senator dole and others think they know the answer, and it’s something the senate tried to fix three years ago but was thwarted.

dole: to the mismanagement of fannie mae and freddie mac, which was made possible by weak oversight and little accountability.

mel martinez (r), florida senator: a lot of what we’re dealing with today has its origins in fannie mae and freddie mac.

angle: fannie mae and freddie mac, backed by the federal government, buy mortgage loans from the lenders who make them. but four years ago, both were in trouble over shoddy accounting. fannie mae chief franklin raines, president clinton’s former budget director, was fired. to placate those in congress who watched over them, fannie and freddie promised to do more to help poor people get mortgages. that led them to buy riskier and riskier home loans from private lenders creating incentives for everyone to make shakier loans.

peter wallison, american enterprise institute: the problem is that they encouraged very bad mortgages to be made by banks and other institutions, because fannie and freddie would buy them.

angle: eventually, they bought trillions of dollars worth of mortgages, a substantial portion of them based on poor credit, then resold many of them to financial institutions who thought they were safe because the federal government was behind them.

wallison: as a result of this appearance that they were backed by the government, people never paid very much attention to the assets they were acquiring or the risks they were taking.

angle: and so shaky mortgages spread throughout the system. but in 2005, the senate banking committee, then chaired by republican richard shelby, tried to rein in the two organizations bypassing some strong new regulations.

wallison: which would have prevented fannie and freddie from acquiring this bad — these bad mortgages. it actually gave a new regulator for fannie and freddie the kinds of powers that a bank regulator had.

angle: all the republicans voted for it. all the democrats, including the current chairman, senator chris dodd, voted against it ( BLOG NOTE – FOR THE RECORD: DEMOCRATS FAIL RIGHT HERE ), and that was after fed chairman alan greenspan had issued a stark warning to senators that fannie and freddie were playing with fire. greenspan said without stronger regulations, “we increase the possibility of insolvency and crisis. without restrictions on the size of fannie mae and freddie mac, we put at risk our ability to preserve safe and sound financial markets in the united states.”

(end videotape)

angle: which turned out to be exactly right, but because democrats blocked it, those new regulations never got consideration by the full senate and died. so that’s how we got into this mess, and how we missed a chance to avoid it. getting out of it now, of course, will be a lot more difficult — brit.

hume: oh, boy. thanks, jim.

in another interview bill clinton admits on video the democrats resisted regulatory reform the republicans were trying to legislate. wow, talk about shooting down obama rhetoric.

for a thorough examination of what exactly happened during the clinton years check out: “the trillion-dollar bank shakedown that bodes ill for cities“, by howard husock, city journal, winter 2000.

find more here about the historical behavior of democrats regarding both warnings and active reform with respect to the current subprime loan financial crisis:
»  going back to 2003, president bush, john snow, alan greenspan warned of the imminent dangers of fannie and freddie. barney frank and chuck shumer suppressed warnings.
»  explosive video, fannie mae ceo calling obama and the dems the “family” and “conscience” of fannie mae
»  obama ranks second in freddie/fannie contributions
»  obama’s connection to sub-prime crisis; crash of economy-1/3
»  shocking video unearthed democrats in their own words covering up the fannie mae, freddie mac scam that caused our economic crisis
»  obama vp vetter resigns over loan criticism
»  mccain’s early recognition of fannie/freddie crisis
»  mccain criticizes obama’s fannie mae and freddie mac connections

no doubt about it, fannie mae, freddy mac, etc and the subprime loan crisis origin RESTS HEAVILY IN THE DEMOCRATIC CAMP. it’s only frail human nature that will cause people to hold stubbornly onto party politics more than fighting for what is good for the country. remember this:

“a statesman is one who works for the next generation. a politician is one who works for the next election.”

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how fannie mae, freddie mac, aig, lehman brothers, bear stearns, merrill lynch, washington mutual and all the rest fit into the big picture.

on the 700 billion thing

bailout chronology (source 1, source 2)
»  bear stearns: 29 billion (source)
»  fannie mae and freddie mac: 200 billion (source 1, source 2)
»  lehman brothers: went bankrupt (source 1, source 2)
“since lehman’s failure, all of the remaining top investment banks on wall street have either merged with other banks, like merrill, or converted into bank holding companies, like morgan stanley, to escape the continuing fallout from stung and angry investors.”
»  aig: 85 billion (source)

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finally, another dose from a clear-thinking american telling it like it is. the big picture. check it out:

more of drinkingwithbob on youtube, veoh, his homepage.

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