It's not secret that H.R. 3221 is about to move on to the president for signing. What's less understood is that a section entitled "Hope for Homeowners Act of 2008" was written by Bank of America. The effect of the bill is to offload from lenders some $300,000,000,000 of some of the worst performing loans to taxpayers.
Senator Dodd (D CT)
introduced the bill stating there would be no investor bailout, but a reading of the bill shows clearly that's what it is.
Dodd has been in the limelight more recently for improprieties related to preferential treatment he received from one of the main beneficiaries of this bill Countrywide Financial. Furthermore the bill, was written by the other main beneficiary, Bank of America Corp.
This bill threatens to extend a housing crisis and the economic recession in that it harms prudent investors and prevents those less prudent from bearing the full consequences of their actions.
The section of the bill that provides for the bailout, and Bank of America internal documents can be found here.
Senators
Kit Bond (R MO)and
Jim DeMint (R S.C.) seem to be the only ones raising any concern about the bailout portion of the bill.
Rep. John A. Boehner, R-Ohio, the House minority leader, called on Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., to hold a hearing investigating allegations that Dodd and Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D., got preferential mortgages at the behest of Countrywide Financial Corp. CEO Angelo Mozilo. Countrywide, a leading subprime lender that has been blamed for helping to cause the mortgage meltdown, is among those that could benefit from the housing rescue.
"Democrats who receive sweetheart deals from their campaign contributors shouldn't be pushing legislation forcing taxpayers to bankroll a $300 billion bailout of scam artists and speculators, and the American people have every right to demand answers if they do," Boehner said in a statement.
Again I don't think this is partisan, it's a problem on both sides, but I'm glad to see someone making a fuss about this.
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Caleb, I've been writing about this bill myself. One of the things that I'd wanted to show, but haven't as of yet, was whose pockets are these legislatures in. If you look at finance and banking and you'll see where the money is coming from for these committees. So how can we expect them to be working for us, the common man?