bu$h* power grab: Rescue Sought for Fannie and Freddie

i thought conservatives were for less government

The plan calls on Congress to give the government the authority over the next two years to buy an unspecified amount of stock in the two companies. Over the same period of time, it would permit the companies to have greater access to the Treasury, by expanding the credit line that each company has from the Treasury. Each company now has a $2.25 billion credit line, set nearly 40 years ago by Congress. At the time, Fannie had only about $15 billion in outstanding debt. It now has total debt of about $800 billion, while Freddie has about $740 billion.

Today the two companies also hold or guarantee mortgages valued at more than $5 trillion.

As part of the plan, the administration will also call on Congress to raise the national debt limit, people briefed on the plan said. And it will ask Congress to give the Federal Reserve a role in setting the rules for how big a capital cushion each company must hold. Giving the Fed a consulting role in the companies’ oversight is seen as yet another way to reassure nervous markets.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/14/washington/14fannieweb.html?hp=&pagewanted=print

Why should they be exempt? Share the pain.

to help ensure there is low income housing, along with liquidity in the mkt (meaning money for the mortgage lenders to lend to thee and me). so they're not exactly like any other lender out there.

Let the free market take care of this. People with a little cash can buy houses at low cost, become house rich and rent at low rents to the people who have lost their homes until the latter get back on their feet and can buy their houses back. Maybe we should start a huge cooperative for that purpose.

I suggest that the bank managers take big salary cuts and stop complaining about the big losses on the value of their stocks in sundry banks including Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Let them learn to live within their means like the rest of us Americans do.

Let the free market have its way. It's supply and demand, isn't it? Funny how when I look for a job with a bank manager's salary, there's no demand, although I am clearly better qualified than they. I can live within my means better than those banks have. Here's the proof: My husband and I raised two wonderful children on peanuts. I know how to stretch a dollar so that it could fit around the bloated waistline of these bankrupt banks. Believe me. A little macaroni and cheese a couple of times a week. Then there is that piece of cheese with no bread and no butter lunch. I am an expert at making ends meet with little money. Move over, you losers at guys at Bank of America, Citicorp, Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac. I dare you to open the market for the bank managers' jobs to experienced housewives. They would learn a thing or to about management. First thing to go -- lunches that cost more than $6.00. After that the "health club" membership. (Walk or bicycle to work instead.) And, of course, the mansions -- sell them to people who could honestly afford them in a real market economy. That might be several families in some cases, but, hey, there's plenty of room for all.

What and who will we bail out next? The FDIC, of course. Meanwhile the dollar will free fall and ordinary Americans won't be able to buy a pencil with a month's salary. Free market, guys. Remember how conservatives have been preaching that since Goldwater. Free market. Let's make them stick to their convictions.

I'm not suggesting socialism. I'm suggesting let the free market take its course. That's what they told me they would do. Why are they going back on their principles, on their promises.

wanted..."Free Market" baby "Free Market", if the businesses fail well they sure as hell shouldn't be bailed out. No sympathy here....move along...it's the Republicans non-monitored, unregulated "Free Market" at play....that's all....

Oh yeah, you're "too big to fail". Sorta like GW.