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Rebutting McCain's Lies Today in Green Bay

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bigtree Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Sep-19-08 01:22 PM
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Rebutting McCain's Lies Today in Green Bay
Edited on Fri Sep-19-08 01:53 PM by bigtree
McCain took only three paragraphs into his speech today in Green Bay, WI, to swipe at Barack Obama and his "leader in Congress." In the very next, McCain complained about "pointing fingers."

His main attack consisted of an already discredited jumble of lies and another preposterous challenge to our collective memories.


here's McCain:

Two years ago, I called for reform of this corruption at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Congress did nothing. The Administration did nothing. Senator Obama did nothing, and actually profited from this system of abuse and scandal. While Fannie and Freddie were working to keep Congress away from their house of cards, Senator Obama was taking their money. He got more, in fact, than any other member of Congress, except for the Democratic chairmen of the committee that oversees them. And while Fannie Mae was betraying the public trust, somehow its former CEO had managed to gain my opponent's trust to the point that Senator Obama actually put him in charge of his vice presidential search.

This CEO, Mr. Johnson, walked off with tens of millions of dollars in salary and bonuses for services rendered to Fannie Mae, even after authorities discovered accounting improprieties that padded his compensation. Another CEO for Fannie Mae, Mr. Raines, has been advising Senator Obama on housing policy. This even after Fannie Mae was found to have committed quote "extensive financial fraud" under his leadership. Like Mr. Johnson, Mr. Raines walked away with tens of millions of dollars.

Senator Obama may be taking their advice and he may be taking their money, but in a McCain-Palin administration, there will be no seat for these people at the policy-making table. They won't even get past the front gate at the White House.

full text: http://www.boston.com/news/politics/2008/articles/2008/09/19/prepared_remarks_by_john_mccain_on_our_financial_markets/?page=full



It's funny how McCain caps off his nonsense about contributions to Obama from Fannie Mae with a promise to bar the White House door to the very class of lobbyists that he's already allowed to command and shape every aspect of his campaign.


from Mother Jones: (http://www.motherjones.com/mojoblog/archives/2008/09/9663_mccain_fannie_freddie.html)

"McCain suggested bold reforms for Fannie and Freddie that would "terminate future lobbying, which was one of the primary contributors to this great debacle . . . If that's the case, McCain should look first to his campaign staffers as the cause of that debacle.One of them was Fannie Mae's head of lobbying, and spread tens of millions of dollars around Washington in the form of lobbying contracts. A number of McCain staffers were on the receiving end of those contracts, collecting hundreds of thousands of dollars each from the lenders to rep their interests. And McCain's campaign manager served as president of a lobbying association that fought to protect Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae from the sort of regulation that McCain is now proposing.

Aquiles Suarez, listed as an economic adviser to the McCain campaign in a July 2007 McCain press release, was formerly the director of government and industry relations for Fannie Mae. The Senate Lobbying Database says Suarez oversaw the lending giant's $47,510,000 lobbying campaign from 2003 to 2006.

And other current McCain campaign staffers were the lobbyists receiving shares of that money. According to the Senate Lobbying Database, the lobbying firm of Charlie Black, one of McCain's top aides, made at least $820,000 working for Freddie Mac from 1999 to 2004. The McCain campaign's vice-chair Wayne Berman and its congressional liaison John Green made $1.14 million working on behalf of Fannie Mae for lobbying firm Ogilvy Government Relations. Green made an additional $180,000 from Freddie Mac. Arther B. Culvahouse Jr., the VP vetter who helped John McCain select Sarah Palin, earned $80,000 from Fannie Mae in 2003 and 2004, while working for lobbying and law firm O'Melveny & Myers LLP. In addition, Politico reports that at least 20 McCain fundraisers have lobbied for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, pocketing at least $12.3 million over the last nine years.

For years McCain campaign manager Rick Davis was head of the Homeownership Alliance, a lobbying association that included Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, real estate agents, homebuilders, and non-profits. According to Politico, the organization opposed congressional attempts at regulation of Fannie and Freddie, along the lines of what John McCain is currently proposing. In his capacity of president of the group, Davis went on record in 2003 and insisted that no further reform of the lenders was necessary, in contradiction to his current boss's sentiments. "Fannie and Freddie are subject to an innovative and stringent risk-based capital stress test," Davis wrote. "The toughest in the financial services industry."



then, there's this reaction to McCain's 'flailing' about from Washington Monthly today: (http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2008_09/014790.php)


WHAT FLAILING LOOKS LIKE.... Is it me, or has John McCain's message become completely incoherent this week?

Yesterday, he got things started by insisting he would fire SEC Chairman Christopher Cox if president, which was odd since a) Cox isn't really to blame; and b) the president can't fire the SEC chair. From there, McCain told an audience, "Sen. Obama's own advisers are saying that the crisis will benefit him politically." Pressed for even a shred of evidence to back that up, McCain's campaign couldn't think of anything. It was just another instance of McCain getting caught in another foolish lie.

from the AP: http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hC9O6sRspcMU1TS3H0CLrE2IWu-gD939NBFO0

Obama's campaign says Raines is not an Obama adviser and that McCain's campaign knows it because Raines said so in an e-mail earlier this week to Carly Fiorina, a top McCain adviser. Obama's campaign provided The Associated Press with a copy of the e-mail.

Obama spokesman Bill Burton ... said Obama only met Raines once briefly at an event, and that Raines sought an introductory meeting with Obama Senate aide Mike Strautmanis. At that meeting, Burton said no advice was sought from or given by Raines, who also had served as President Clinton's budget director.

I'd just add that while the attack is plainly wrong, it's foolish even if we accept the attack at face value. If getting advice from an official at a troubled financial institution is a sign of bad judgment, then why is that two of McCain's top advisors include John Thain, from Merrill Lynch, and Martin Feldstein, who serves on AIG's board of directors?


Stunning, isn't it?
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bigtree Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Sep-19-08 01:53 PM
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