Innocent Bystanders

FBI Investigating Rich White People, and Michael Sells a House September 23, 2008

Martha Stewart is out of jail, so I guess they have an empty cell.  The FBI is investigating corporate misdeeds, and they are hot on the trail of greedy Rich White People to blame for our problems.

Rest assured, this guy pictured below is not going to go to jail.  He’s not a corporate executive.  He’s not even white.

Public Enemy No. 1

WASHINGTON – The FBI is investigating four major U.S. financial institutions whose collapse helped trigger a $700 billion bailout plan by the Bush administration, The Associated Press has learned.

Two law enforcement officials said Tuesday the FBI is looking at potential fraud by mortgage finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and insurer American International Group Inc. Additionally, a senior law enforcement official said Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. also is under investigation.

The inquiries will focus on the financial institutions and the individuals that ran them, the senior law enforcement official said.

The law enforcement officials spoke on condition of anonymity because the investigations are ongoing and are in the very early stages.

Officials said the new inquiries bring to 26 the number of corporate lenders under investigation over the past year.

FBI investigating companies at heart of meltdown – Yahoo! News.

Oh sure, let’s blame those Rich White People.

Meanwhile, the real criminals are skating.  By “real criminals” I mean the politicians who supported the Community Reinvestment Act — long after it was known that the CRA was a scam, based on fraudulent assertions that “underserved communities” had been victimized by “redlining” and were in dire need of “affordable housing.”   So we saw the same old thing — Federal handouts easily become entrenched and addictive, even after it is clear that they have no rational purpose (don’t get me started on dairy subsidies).

Democrats, like the highly influential Charles Rangel, Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, blocked reforms that were urged by many Republicans, including John McCain.  To no avail — that “affordable housing” was real important for “underserved communities.”  Banks were literally forced to issue imprudent loans that defied all previous standards of creditworthiness, and  avid sales reps cashed in commissions by selling ARMs and up-front teaser rates to the ignorant.

Previously sober institutions like Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, insulated from risk by the implied protection of Uncle Sam, were more than happy to package these mortgages and securitize them to gullible investors who believed the housing market could only go up.  Never mind the inexorable demographics of an aging Baby Boom population.

Thus was the corruption born that led to our current crisis.

Guess who is going to pay for this?

Me.

And people like me.  Rich White People.  I’m one of those five percent of the U.S. wage earners that pay sixty percent of the federal income taxes.

Plus, just today I flipped my Ohio house to a relocation company for it’s appraised value in a dead market, which means I took a loss.  A big loss.

Rangel, of course, thinks that he is only guilty of becoming a political target due to some inadvertent errors:

Rangel claims that he is being villainized by Republicans as part of their effort to win back the House, as well as headline-seeking reporters, and said that he has done nothing wrong. Rangel has been hit by a series of press reports detailing alleged ethics violations, including his failure to pay taxes on $75,000 in income from a vacation home in the Dominican Republic, his use of his congressional office to raise funds for the Rangel Center in New York City, and his control of four rent-stabilized apartments in a Harlem high-rise that he lives in. The House ethics committee is expected to vote next week to begin a formal investigation of the allegations, as requested by Rangel.

“The campaign season has begun, and to no great surprise, I’m now a Republican talking point. But I assure you, I’ve brought no dishonor to my family, the Congress, my constituents, or my country,” Rangel said in his letter.

Politico.

Fuck you, Charles Rangel.