posted on October 30, 2008 07:13:31 PM new
I don't know why this article didn't hold more import for me in March, when it was published. Perhaps I was too focused on the war and failed to appreciate the enormity of the downward spiral of our economy that was created by the bastards McCain chose to run his campaign and to handle him. To be fair, I think McCain's closest associates are right - there are two McCains - the rascally Maverick centrist McCain and the desperate McCain who sold his soul to the Rovian factor in the Republican party to win the nomination. I don't trust either one of them.
Key McCain advisors were lobbyists for shady lender
BY DAVID SALTONSTALL
DAILY NEWS SENIOR CORRESPONDENT
Monday, March 31st 2008, 4:00 AM
When Sen. John McCain addressed the nation's burgeoning mortgage mess last week, he insisted it was time for a little "straight talk."
"I will not play election-year politics with the housing crisis," the GOP presidential hopeful insisted while unveiling his plan, which many have since described as friendlier to the mortgage industry than the Democrats' proposals.
What McCain did not say - which some believe smacks of politics - is that two of his top advisers were recently lobbyists for a notorious lender in the mortgage meltdown.
John Green, the senator's chief liaison to Congress, and Wayne Berman, his national finance co-chairman, billed more than $720,000 in lobbying fees from 2005 through last year to Ameriquest Mortgage through their lobbying firm, disclosure forms reviewed by the Daily News show.
Ameriquest, which since has been bought out, was forced to settle suits with 49 states for $325 million. More than 13,680 New York homeowners got taken for a ride by the company, records show.
"They would be defined as the most blatant and aggressive predatory lenders out of everybody," said Bruce Marks, head of the nonprofit Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America.
Despite their past familiarity with the issue, neither Green or Berman had any input into McCain's plan for dealing with the lending crisis, aides to the Arizona senator said last week.
"Sen. McCain has never done anything that would violate the public trust and he has never done favors for special interests or lobbyists," said McCain spokesman Tucker Bonds.
While far from a bailout for the mortgage industry, McCain's plan focuses on less regulation for lenders - in sharp contrast with proposals by Democrats Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama - and suggests as a first step convening a big meeting of top mortgage lenders.
But the migration of Green and Berman to McCain's campaign comes as the Arizona senator faces criticism on other fronts for aligning himself with lobbyists, whom McCain often derides - but relies upon to staff his campaign.
They include McCain campaign manager Rick Davis, a former telecommunications lobbyist, as well as Thomas Loeffler, McCain's national finance co-chairman, who recently helped Europe's Airbus consortium land a deal for Air Force tankers.
posted on October 30, 2008 10:41:37 PM new
Bill, I've read your links on Obama's connections, which are mainly friends of friends vs McCain's connections which are top advisers, not retired. I am not moved.
posted on October 31, 2008 04:19:47 AM new
Bill - I don't see smoking guns here, sorry.
Re the "Friends of Angelo" article (as it concerns Dodd):come on Bill! I used to be a mortgage banker and I can tell you that there is nothing out of the ordinary here. High profile borrowers, realtors and others that direct business to the firm as well as employees receive similar treatment in the industry all the time.
"Feinberg has said that the savings Dodd reaped on one loan would have saved him about "$77,000, if the loan was kept for a 30-year period of time."
And those non-negotiable "fees" that lenders whack consumers with? Being a prominent politician and a leader on the Senate Banking Committee makes them disappear.
"The fees that are waived are what we call lender fees; the world calls them junk fees or garbage fees. You are [waiving] document preparation, underwriting fees and processing fees."
This saved Sen. Dodd "in the neighborhood" of $1,000 or $2,000, Feinberg has said."
That's nothing! It isn't illegal - nearly anyone can get that kind of pricing. Ok maybe not Joe the plumber but I'll bet Cash would and Joe too if his aunt worked for the company. They waived the junk fees (and that is done all the time) and gave him a little discount on the interest rate.
** Some Friends of Angelo received even more favorable treatment, particularly former FNMA head James Johnson. He used Countrywide to finance several properties. I still say that the interest rate break and fee discounts are discretionary. The waiver of underwriting standards would be of more concern if the mortgages were securitized or sold to unwitting investors or backed by FNMA.
Maybe poor Bill who tried to drum up a little sleeze in defense of his failed candidate will find some solace in this article...
Blame the party, not the campaign
By James Carville
Financial Times
Published: October 30 2008 19:30 | Last updated: October 30 2008 19:30
The most predictable and fascinating ritual of American electoral politics has begun. And, no, I am not talking about early voting or pundit predictions. It is not last-minute robo-calls or get-out-the-vote operations either.
I am talking about finger-pointing. Yes, the blame game. In case you have not noticed, it is in full tilt.
You may think the blame game is played in smoky back rooms and dark alleys. Be under no illusions. The blame game is not merely a sideshow of the drama of the world’s most influential democracy, which elects the world’s most influential leader. In the coming weeks, watching the Republican party implode will be the main event.
The opening salvo was fired in the op-ed pages of the US newspaper of record, The New York Times. On October 13, William Kristol drew his guns in what he believed to be the start of the Republican civil war by beginning his weekly column: “It’s time for John McCain to fire his campaign.” He continued: “Its combination of strategic incoherence and operational incompetence has become toxic.”
Such an esteemed conservative intellectual would, of course, place blame on the “McCain campaign”. What a convenient target. This is the same Mr Kristol who advised the party in two of its greatest disasters – the Iraq war and the selection of Governor Sarah Palin as the Republican vice-presidential nominee. His idea is to point the finger at political professionals.
My colleague, Paul Begala, and I counselled Republicans on October 20 that the blame game could not begin soon enough and could not leave out any faction of the fractured Republican infrastructure. With so much blame to go around, I am sure everyone will get their own shots in but the people who work on the fringes of our democracy should not bear the brunt of an entire American political party going awry.
Allow me to rise in defence of my fellow political operatives.
The truth is that there was little Mr McCain, or his campaign, could do with a party falling apart at the seams. When Mr McCain announced his second run for the presidency on April 25 2007 in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, the Republican brand was already tarnished, perhaps beyond repair. At that time, a poll for Democracy Corps, a non-profit polling organisation I co-founded, found that his party was viewed more negatively than positively by far, with 47 per cent of likely voters giving it poor marks and just 34 per cent viewing it positively. At that point 66 per cent of likely voters thought the country was on the wrong track. Of course, it only got worse as the campaign and George W. Bush’s horrendous presidency trudged on. Our latest poll finds that 79 per cent say the country is headed in the wrong direction.
Remember, it was not Mr McCain’s campaign that started the idiotic Iraq war or masterminded the poorly thought out strategies there and on the economic front at home.
It was not his campaign staffers that reignited ridiculously divisive and unnecessary culture wars in 2004 just to win an election, in the process alienating a generation of young Americans.
It was not a campaign staffer that simply flew over a major American city as it was being inundated with water after the failure of federal levees created one of the worst disasters in our nation’s history.
It was not a McCain staffer who made the brilliant choice to appoint Alberto “Fredo” Gonzales as attorney-general, a man who will surely go down as one of the most buffoonish and incompetent individuals to serve in the US government.
It was not just a few McCain staffers who sold their soul and their political party to corporate America and Wall Street while the national debt soared.
It was not McCain campaign staffers who sat idly by as America plunged into its greatest crisis since the Great Depression. (Although one might pause here to note that Mr McCain and his economic advisers played an active role in creating the crisis over the past few decades.)
Blame the idiotic neocons, absurd culture warriors or the talk-radio crowd. Certainly do not forget the silly free-marketers who are now lining up before congressional committees to apologise to the nation for failed economic policy. Believe me, they all deserve every bit of of the blame.
But it was the pillars and icons of the party who did this: from Karl Rove, its self-proclaimed resident genius, to Dick Cheney, an overreaching vice-president, to Mr Bush. Of course, lest any of this read as an absolution of Mr McCain, the senator from Arizona was in lock-step with his colleagues on most or all of their failed policies.
Ultimately, the truth is that Mr McCain’s campaign was dealt an awful hand, albeit one he had a role in creating. You can second guess how they played it (and you should) but campaigns take chances (like they did in doubling-down on Ms Palin) when they are behind. So with only a few days to go before the party is handed its second mammoth loss in as many cycles, following the 2006 mid-term elections, my counsel to Republican friends would be to keep pointing fingers but lay off the political professionals as much as possible. They were not the ones responsible for the disastrous Bush-Cheney-Rove policies that Americans so desperately want to reverse.
The writer is an international political consultant, founder of Democracy Corps, and a CNN political contributor. He was chief strategist for Bill Clinton’s 1992 campaign
posted on November 1, 2008 07:03:12 AM new
Helen,
Bill removing his posts and announcing he is no longer going to post reminds me of Fluff's temper tantrums. Seems immature to me. IMO
***
A poll is not a prediction. It is a snapshot of how people are thinking right now.
posted on November 1, 2008 07:49:55 AM new
I remember Linda doing the same thing. She always came back.
Cheryl
Whitman said she and McCain share a philosophy of scaling back the role of government. a point of view partly shaped by her EBay experience. "The EBay model is very Republican in its essence -- it's about making a small number of rules and getting out of the way while not overtaxing the community," she said.
I suppose Bill needs to find a topic that he can support. The number of complete edits that he has accumulated here is an indication that he lacks the courage of his convictions.
[ edited by kozersky on Oct 31, 2008 09:34 AM ]
