Fannie Mae to introduce new home ownership program for sub-prime borrowers

News Release

October 06, 2010

Fannie Mae CEO Mike Williams Announces New Housing Finance Program for Sub-prime Homeowner Wannabes

Calling it the No Money Upside Down program, Fannie Mae CEO Mike Williams announced an innovative new program designed to help sub-prime homebuyers grab their share of the American Dream.

The No Money Upside Down Program allows almost anyone to borrow up to 150% of a new home’s value.  Borrowers with lousy credit, no discernible source of regular income and a history of defaulting on credit cards and installment loans are eligible, Williams told reporters.

“Today, millions of low income, no account Americans are suffering from the inability to participate in the American Dream of home ownership. Just because they have struggled to pay their bills in the past and have walked away from debt before, they should still have a shot to grab their fair share.

“This program lets them do just that,” he said.

“This program is exactly what he had in mind when we passed the banking regulation bill,” said reigning Banking Queen, Representative Barney Frank.  Frank, who is in a surprisingly competitive race for reelection, was eager to offer support for the new program. 

“This doesn’t have to be about improving the liquidity and health of the financial sector.  This has to be about making sure people can borrow way more money than they can afford to pay back and buy the same kinds of houses that their rich neighbors buy."

(h/t @JosephAGallant for the image)

Featured in the News: Financial Regulation done. Pharma Reg next?

• With finreg done, time for pharmreg reform—Of course!  It’s the only boogeyman left.
• Dr. Laura to end her radio career—”I am not retiring. I am not quitting. I feel energized."
• FCC Takes Another Step Towards Regulating the Internet – Without the cover of legislation, the FCC is moving anyway.
• Biden's Stimulus Forecast Dead Wrong – Senate Republicans remind Uncle Joe that things were supposed to be much better by now.
• N.Y. Dems Go AWOL – Brave Sir Robins run away.
• Pelosi: New Yorkers should decide on mosque—But the Botox Bitch can count votes as well as Harry Reid. But, we await our subpoenas.
• Bond king wants to nationalize Fannie; Wells Fargo wants permanent TARP –The big guys have tasted Financial Regulation Reform, and they want more of it.  Meanwhile…
• More dreadful numbers for Democrats – No one doing any serious polling now sees anything but Jackass blood in the streets on Nov 3.
• Taiwanese Animation Takes On... 2010 Elections—No comment!  But go click anyway.
• Cavuto: Fannie, Freddie Not Going Away—The government is as firmly entrenched in the mortgage market as ever, and not much will change anytime soon.
• Fed President Admits: Sorry, We Can't Help The Economy Anymore—Liquidity trap.
• Arkansas broadcaster wears Florida Gators hat, loses job—Dude, this is the SEC.  You need to understand your loyalties around here!
• Coastal Crisis: Ground Zero II—Meet one of the guys who pilots those awesome ROV’s at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico.
• BP to stop accepting oil claims as government-appointed administrator moves in—An oil exploration and production company gets out of the insurance claims business that it didn’t do such a good job in.
• The Propaganda Presidency—”An unprecedented number of public relations and propaganda efforts,” including efforts that the committee found to be inappropriate or illegal.

Gimme some feedback in the comments.

Years of National Denial -- Sound Familiar?

From The Observer:

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Deep inside the august halls of Athens University, the renowned political commentator Paschos Mandravelis will deliver a message this week that until very recently was lost on most Greeks.
His speech will focus on a single fact: that the country in the centre of the storm of Europe's worst crisis since the creation of the common market, missed the biggest story ever – its own looming bankruptcy. "Everyone," he says, "starting with the Greek media, was in an incredible state of denial."

The Greek spirit of resistance turns its guns on the IMF | World news | The Observer

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Does this sound familiar? Senator Chris Dodd famously told us that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were "fundamentally strong." Reuters and the Associated Press routinely and comically employ the adverb "unexpectedly" when communicating that the US labor market or economic output underperformed during the previous period. Pundit after talking-head pundit tell us on CNN and MSNBC that the economic recovery is well under way. That TARP saved the day. That the stimulus "saved or created" millions of jobs. Everything is fine. Pay no attention to runaway entitlement spending. Pay no mind to the shell game that Congressional Democrats used to ram through the Obamacare debacle. Ignore the fact that the only difference between Greece and the states of California, New York and Michigan is that none of those states have been bailed out by the IMF (yet).

The Greek financial crisis, which even after the pending bailout could still threaten other members of the EU, is a complete meltdown of the entire statist, entitlement-driven model of government. The "austerity" measures being "forced down the throats" of the Greeks include such draconian, near-inhuman measures such as reducing Easter, summer and Christmas bonuses for government employees and increasing the retirement age from an average of 61 to 65. What do the beneficiaries of these programs do? Having finally run out of other people's money, Greek socialists took to the streets. They looted, burned, pillaged, rioted and killed people to save their way of life.

What preceded the episodes of the last several weeks were several years of complete denial that the leftist Greek government was driving the country into bankruptcy. Virtually no one in Greek society was willing to admit that a serious problem loomed. Greek politicos denied it. The Greek media, as chummy with the socialists as the US media is with our own leftists, denied it. The people of Greece, living large off of government handouts and entitlements, denied it.

Does it all sound familiar?