PrintMarch 6, 2009
Barney's Pre-emptive Prosecution
The man who has the most to lose from a fair investigation of the Fannie, Freddie and the financial crisis wants to make sure prosecutors understand who the proper targets are. Kevin Drawbaugh and John Poirier of Reuters report about Barney Frank's plans for new legislation, and his message to prosecutors:
Wrongdoers will be prosecuted, he said. The committee will ask U.S. law enforcement authorities about their plans to prosecute executives and institutions that contributed to the worst financial crisis in generations.
Conspicuously absent from Frank's list of targets: a legislator who received contributions from Fannie and Freddie executives, whose lover was a senior executive at Fannie, and who resisted attempts to reign them in from the reckless policies.
Nobody needs to remind D o J prosecutors who Eric Holder is, and who appropriates funding for their salaries.
Steve Gilbert comments:
Perhaps the best defense is a good offense, after all.Of course in an even slightly more just world, Mr. Frank would be the first in line to go to jail.For Mr. Frank led the vanguard of those pushing banks and other institutions to give mortgages and loans to people who could not afford them or who probably would not pay them back even if they could.Mr. Frank also fought tooth and painted nail any effort and all efforts to regulate Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and the other government lending institutions.But to hear this grotesquely corrupt blowhard calling for show trials and the prosecution of others really takes the biscuit.
