"You peons will never know how profitable it is to be connected," Mozilo said.
Posted on 06/27/2008 9:40:37 PM PDT by Uncle Ralph
NEW YORK TIMES: "About that Mortgage, Senator . . ."
It turns out that the chieftain of Countrywide -- which is smack in the middle of the mortgage mess -- extended privileged borrowing status to two Senators, Chris Dodd, Democrat of Connecticut, and Kent Conrad, Democrat of North Dakota. Both Senators deny any ethical violations.
The disclosure of the V.I.P. arrangments by the political website Politico.com left constituents angry and suspicious -- particularly because the revelations came just as Congress was rousing itself to do something about the mortgage foreclosure crisis.
It would be nice to think that members of Congress did not go into the process with any undue friendships with the mortgage companies.
The Senate ethics committee, normally known for profound silence in the face of members' scandals, has proposed having more stringent disclosure rules as a part of the chamber's standing regulations. Currently, home mortgages are exempt from loan disclosure rules. (Why? we'd like to know. Is there something about graft given in the form of a home mortgage that is less corrupting than other forms of graft?)
Indeed. Plus this: Mortgages: Sleaze-o-rama:
More sleaze oozed out of the subprime mortgage mess this month with news that two U.S. senators got sweetheart loans from a giant mortgage company.
One of them, Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., heads the Senate Banking Committee, which gives him heavy clout over mortgage lenders. The other is Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D.
Angelo Mozilo, the controversial chairman of Countrywide Financial, gave both of them loans at low fees and reduced interest rates. . . .
It's difficult to say what is more remarkable about the senators' behavior: the petty venality or the stupidity.
Mr. Conrad was the more crass of the two. While shopping for a loan, he called James Johnson, the former chairman of mortgage giant Fannie Mae and a former top adviser to Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee. Mr. Johnson happened to be with Mr. Mozilo when Mr. Conrad's call came through. Mr. Mozilo got on the line and got the senator's loan application rolling.
Mr. Dodd says he didn't ask for favors from Mr. Mozillo. Maybe so, but the senator knew that Countrywide had placed him in a special program for VIPs. It got him special treatment and an interest rate available only to special customers. Mr. Conrad borrowed more than $1 million, Mr. Dodd more than $775,000.
It also turned out that Mr. Johnson himself got a sweetheart loan from Countrywide. When that fact surfaced, he resigned his position heading Mr. Obama's vice presidential search committee.
Sleaze-o-rama, indeed. And as I've noted before, the real problem isn't so much the mortgages, as the culture of entitlement that made the mortgages seem no big deal.
Heck, even The Socialist Worker sees the problem:
BUT WHILE millions grapple with rising mortgage payments or see their wealth evaporate with falling house prices, members of Congress continue to benefit from favorable treatment by mortgage lenders--the very same lenders who will get a bailout if proposed legislation passes.
The housing bill's key backers in the Senate--Chris Dodd (D-Conn.), head of the Senate Banking Committee, and Kent Conrad (D-N.D.), who chairs the Senate Budget Committee--both got special deals from the nation's biggest mortgage lender, Countrywide, thanks to their connections with the company's CEO, Angelo Mozilo.
"Dodd, the lead sponsor of the bill, secured no-closing-cost mortgages at interest rates of 4 percent and 4.25 percent, and continues to insist he got no special favors," the Rocky Mountain News reported. Conrad admitted calling Mozilo for help with a discount on a $1 million mortgage for a beach house, but also claims that it was legitimate.
Now Dodd and Conrad are in position to return the favor to the mortgage industry. If the current bill passes the House, Countrywide and other lenders will see U.S. taxpayers assume responsibility for mortgage defaults.
Do tell. Plus, from the Hartford Courant: "Come Clean, Senators."
"Sen. Chris Dodd of Connecticut, who will be chairman of the Rules and Administration Committee, was chairman of the Democratic National Committee and 'one of the masterminds of the Chinagate scandal.'"
http://archive.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2001/5/25/192446.shtml
Vote all incumbents out!
Vote all incumbents out!
I second that motion!
I second that motion!
Senator Conrad gave Chinagate figure John Huang a recommendation to get a job in Ron Brown’s Commerce department after receiving $10,000 from various figures, including John Huang and the Riady’s. These folks are untouchable because without public scrutiny from the press there is no accountability.
"...a statement [Bill] Clinton made in February 2002, in which he told an audience in Australia, 'This is a unique moment in U.S. history, a brief moment in history, when the U.S. has preeminent military, economic and political power. It won't last forever. This is just a period, a few decades this will last.'
Clinton continued...
'In all probability, we won't be the premier political and economic power we are now' in a few decades, he said, pointing to the growth of China's economy and the growing economic strength of the European Union.
Whether the United States maintains its military supremacy, he said, depends in part on how much those other entities invest in their militaries, and Clinton said working cooperatively is essential to U.S. interests.
But he said he did not want to be misunderstood. 'I never advocated that we not have the strongest military in the world...I don't think a single soul has thought I was advocating scaling back our military.'
Source: Washington Post article from May 2003:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&node=&contentId=A62253-2003Apr30¬Found=true
or find his remarks here (Talon News):
Clinton Predicts America's Decline:
http://mensnewsdaily.com/archive/newswire/nw03/talonnews/0503/newswire-tn-050503d.htm
"'We like your president. We want to see him reelected', former Chinese intelligence chief General Ji Shengde told Chinagate bagman Johnny Chung. Indeed, Chinese intelligence organized a massive covert operation aimed at tilting the 1996 election Clinton’s way."
The Idiot's Guide to Chinagate
By Richard Poe
May 26, 2003
CHINA WILL LIKELY replace the USA as world leader, said Bill Clinton in a recent Washington Post interview. It is just a matter of time. Clinton should know. He has personally done more to build China’s military strength than any man on earth.
Most Americans have heard of the so-called "Chinagate " scandal. Few understand its deadly import, however. Web sites such as "Chinagate for Dummies" and its companion "More Chinagate for Dummies" offer some assistance. Unfortunately, with a combined total of nearly 8,000 words, these two sites – like so many others of the genre – offer more detail than most of us "dummies" can absorb.
For that reason, in the 600 words left in this column, I will try to craft my own "Idiot’s Guide to Chinagate," dedicated to all those busy folks like you and me whose attention span tends to peter out after about 750 words. Here goes.
When Bill Clinton took office in 1993, China presented little threat to the United States. Chinese missiles "couldn’t hit the side of a barn," notes Timothy W. Maier of Insight magazine. Few could reach North America and those that made it would likely miss their targets.
Thanks to Bill Clinton, China can now hit any city in the USA, using state-of-the-art, solid-fueled missiles with dead-accurate, computerized guidance systems and multiple warheads.
China probably has suitcase nukes as well. These enable China to strike by proxy – equipping nuclear-armed terrorists to do their dirty work, while the Chinese play innocent. Some intelligence sources claim that China maintains secret stockpiles of chemical, biological and nuclear weapons on U.S. soil, for just such contingencies.
In 1997, Clinton allowed China to take over the Panama Canal. The Chinese company Hutchison Whampoa leased the ports of Cristobal and Balboa, on the east and west openings of the canal respectively, thus controlling access both ways. A public outcry stopped Clinton in 1998 from leasing California’s Long Beach Naval Yard to the Chinese firm COSCO. Even so, China can now strike U.S. targets easily from their bases in Panama, Vancouver and the Bahamas.
How did China catch up so fast? Easy. We sold them all the technology they needed – or handed it over for free. Neither neglect nor carelessness are to blame. Bill Clinton did it on purpose.
As a globalist, Clinton promotes "multipolarity"– the doctrine that no country (such as the USA) should be allowed to gain decisive advantage over others.
To this end, Clinton appointed anti-nuclear activist Hazel O’Leary to head the Department of Energy. O’Leary set to work "leveling the playing field," as she put it, by giving away our nuclear secrets. She declassified 11 million pages of data on U.S. nuclear weapons and loosened up security at weapons labs.
Federal investigators later concluded that China made off with the "crown jewels" of our nuclear weapons research under Clinton’s open-door policy – probably including design specifications for suitcase nukes. Meanwhile, Clinton and his corporate cronies raked in millions.
In his book The China Threat, Washington Times correspondent Bill Gertz describes how the system worked. Defense contractors eager to sell technology to China poured millions of dollars into Clinton’s campaign. In return, Clinton called off the dogs. Janet Reno and other counterintelligence officials stood down while Lockheed Martin, Hughes Electronics, Loral Space & Communications and other U.S. companies helped China modernize its nuclear strike force.
"We like your president. We want to see him reelected," former Chinese intelligence chief General Ji Shengde told Chinagate bagman Johnny Chung. Indeed, Chinese intelligence organized a massive covert operation aimed at tilting the 1996 election Clinton’s way.
Clinton’s top campaign contributors for 1992 were Chinese agents; his top donors in 1996 were U.S. defense contractors selling missile technology to China.
Clinton received funding directly from known or suspected Chinese intelligence agents, among them James and Mochtar Riady who own the Indonesian Lippo Group; John Huang; Charlie Trie; Ted Sioeng; Maria Hsia; Wang Jun and others.
Commerce Secretary Ron Brown served as Clinton’s front man in many Chinagate deals. When investigators began probing Brown’s Lippo Group and Chinagate connections, Brown died suddenly in a suspicious April 1996 plane crash.
Needless to say, China does not share Clinton’s enthusiasm for globalism or multipolarity. The Chinese look out for Number One.
"War [with the United States] is inevitable; we cannot avoid it," said Chinese Defense Minister General Chi Haotian in 2000. "The issue is that the Chinese armed forces must control the initiative in this war." Bill Clinton has given them a good start.
The Idiot's Guide to Chinagate:
http://www.richardpoe.com/column.cgi?story=125
or,
http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2003/5/26/214938.shtml
"You peons will never know how profitable it is to be connected," Mozilo said.
Ping
Senator Dodd, take your abortion loving money and stick it where the sun don't shine.
I still smile when I think about that Pastor doing the right thing.
“Privileged borrowing status?”
Bull. It was just the standard borrowing status, nothing more.
Standard for Senators, that is. After all, they work hard for it.
Is it coincidence that Privileged Borrowing Status is abbreviated PBS?
So what is the surprise?
Their elected officals correct.
The average joe sixpack would be in jail by now.
These are the type of people who are making laws, but not for themselves only the tax payers and the voters, they could care less about them until it’s time for re-election.
Wake up voters, time to take out the trash.
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