Breaking: McCain Campaign General Co-Chair At Heart Of Foreclosure Crisis--UPDATED
By Logan Murphy Monday May 26, 2008 8:20pm
Breaking news on Tuesday's Countdown, as Keith Olbermann reveals that former Senator Phil Gramm, a general co-chair of Senator John McCain's campaign, actually lobbied Congress on behalf of financial giant UBS to try and stop legislation aimed at installing industry regulations that could have prevented the current mortgage foreclosure crisis. As with many issues, McCain has done a full flip flop on the mortgage crisis and the gaffe filled train wreck that is his campaign continues to fall deeper into the muck. Can you imagine the outrage from the right and McCain's media if Gramm worked for a Democratic candidate's campaign?
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Gramm officially joined the McCain campaign on March 12, 2007... but as early as October, 2006, RealClearPolitics reported that McCain was already relying on Gramm for fundraising help... McCain's top political operative at the time saying, Gramm, quote, "obviously gives us advice on economic issues."
At the same time he was giving that advice, federal disclosure forms reviewed by Countdown show that Gramm was simultaneously being paid by UBS to lobby the U-S Senate about the mortgage crisis... opposing government regulation... helping to kill a 2006 anti-predatory lending bill that would have tightened consumer protections, and might have mitigated the current crisis...
As recently as Dec. 31st of last year, still working for Swiss bankers specifically to help kill the "Emergency Home Ownership and Mortgage Equity Protection Act" and the "Helping Families Save Their Homes in Bankruptcy Act," a bill that would have let bankruptcy judges adjust mortgage terms so American families facing foreclosure could repay their loans, and keep their homes.
UPDATE: The McCain campaign asked Olbermann to read a statement from them : Download | play Download | play
(Transcript below the fold...)
Three months later, McCain gave his broadest statement to date on the mortgage crisis...
"Our financial market approach should include encouraging increased capital in financial institutions by removing regulatory, accounting and tax impediments"
"Removing regulatory impediments," a Gramm mantra... Politico dot-com writing, "some housing experts and economists see Gramm's thinking in the recent housing proposal."
The McCain campaign confirmed that Gramm had input on the speech and that McCain consulted Gramm specifically on the housing issue.
Some economists blame Gramm in part for the crisis itself.
As Senate Banking Chairman, Gramm consistently weakened federal regulations... his deregulation of energy commodities first helped his wife's employer... then killed it.
In 1999, the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, which McCain voted for, broke down the decades-old wall separating commercial banks, heavily regulated... from the wild and woolly world of investment banking... a wall erected in 1933 to prevent a repeat... of the Great Depression.
One month after Gramm knocked that wall down, UBS bragged to investors that his bill would "liberalize restrictions."
UBS bought Paine Weber the very next year... and hired Gramm before he even left the Senate.
Gramm's deregulation helped set the stage for an explosion of banks slicing up subprime mortgages, bundling them with other mortgage slices to hide the credit risks, and selling mortgage stew to other investment firms.
That gave lenders powerful incentive to make as many loans as possible, regardless of risk... because they could turn around and sell those mortgages almost immediately.
Gramm himself said he was "totally unaware" just how many bad mortgages his own company bought.
At last count, UBS had lost 37 billion in the mortgage crisis, and plans to lay off 55-hundred people next year, primarily in the US.
McCain has hinted he might make Gramm his Treasury Secretary.
But Gramm's economic track record worries even McCain's own advisors... one of them telling the Washington Post last month, "I, for one, have thought about it a lot."
One economist said, "McCain is counting on people having very short memories and not connecting some pretty obvious dots here."
Two weeks after that report, UBS removed Gramm from its list of registered lobbyists.
But federal lobbying forms show at least two other McCain staffers... congressional liaison John Green... and national finance co-chairman Wayne Berman... were both still lobbying on behalf of the mortgage industry as recently as the first quarter of this year.
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DAMN!
Thank God we have McCain to guide us as a Maverick and a reformer.
Boring... Like, he wouldn't *be* a Republican if he weren't a thief. Duh?
Shocker
Phil Gramm? Isn't he the Texas Republican who had plastic surgery to thin his voluptuous lips?
Goddam Gramm, millions are or have lost their homes and he's lobbying for the big banks to keep the money wheels turning. With Americans like this who cares about Al Qaeda. This guy is an economic hitman on his own citizens. McShame is a magnet for the lowest scum of the republican establishment.
Please, Sen McCain "my friends" his way out of this.
And we're surprised by this...why?
Right outside the gates of military posts; payday loaners, shaddy car dealers and topless joints.
Nothing new here.
ubs-the new bcci.
Typical Republican strategy. No regulation - trust big business and the benefits will trickle down to all the employees. They know it's BS but they still continue to fool people - amazing.
By no means amazing. Follow the money and it leads back to... Bush, McCain and top repubs. The sun still rises in the east!
knight rider @ 11:
United Serfs of America
L.A. Confidential @ 13:
Got to watch War, Inc.
Hits the nail right on the head.
The Democratic Majority: A Rich Republican’s Best Friend
I hope sombody is keeping a record of all the
BushMcCain shenanigans. I can't keep track of it all.We can rid ourselves of these people if we all band together in the General Election. There are WAY more of us than them.
Scy @ 17:
So who's going to count the votes?
Jo @ 18:
Diebold.
Jo @ 18:
Diebold, Inc.
harley @ 20:
You could have been 1st if you hadn't typed inc.
This is like Christmas. The real competition was Hillary. McBush's clone is so done. Keep the scandals coming.
Ron @ 21:
LMAO. I was thinking the same thing.
War, Inc
Diebold, Inc
Goes hand and hand.
Phil Gramm, another loathsome, Texas asshole. What a scourge these humanoids are.
harley Says: "Right outside the gates of military posts; payday loaners, shaddy car dealers and topless joints. Nothing new here."
You forgot right wing preachers.
L.A. Confidential @ 4:
LA,
I lived in Texas for about 6 years. Take it from me, when it comes to Phil Gramm there is nothing shocking. He's about as consistent a sonofabitch as you could ever find.
Hilarious the way Howard Fineman has to keep reassuring himself of McCain's inherent maverickyness, and how awful it must be for the poor maverick to have to depend on all his cronies for money.
anneyhussein @ 5:
flabby lips causing loud release gas problems !!!
Also, remember Wendy (Mrs. Gramm) on the board of directors - because of her Ph.D. in economics- of Enron.
kerplunk @ 25:
My point is the military have been feed on for a long time. Young, first time away from home and a steady check = shark attacks.
Is this any surprise? I just hope the ADD media stays on this until November.
So many lobbyists, so little time...
Phil Gramm, even his friends don't like him! - Molly Ivens.
Jo @ 16:
Why bother?
nobody will be held accountable anyway!
Progressives seem to have "progressed" right on past all the high crimes and misdemeanors committed by the neo-cons...
...and seem quite ready to "move on" .org
Although I have been keeping a list I gave up on accountability along time ago.
lets see?
Enron...
Patriot act...
wiretapping...
unfounded undeclared illegal war based on false pretenses...
Katrina...
torture...
holding "detainees" without trial...ect.. ect..
unless we (somehow) get some accountability for some of the crimes listed above...
I wouldnt bother keepin a list of McCain "shennanigans"...
". . . Olbermann reveals that former Senator Phil Gramm . . . lobbied Congress on behalf of financial giant UBS to try and stop legislation aimed at installing industry regulations that could have prevented the current mortgage foreclosure crisis. "
Saying the proposed bill "could have prevented" the mortgage crisis is probably a big exaggeration. Tens of millions of subprime loans had already been made when it was proposed in 2006. The bill seemed to be an attempt to slow the foreclosure process after borrowers had gone into default - it was not aimed at preventing or reducing the massive volume subprime lending in the first place. A band-aid, in other words, not a remedy.
It's a good post, and an important story. But the mortgage problem is so huge, Gramm's obstruction of a band-aid consumer bill in all likelihood didn't make much of a difference. If the bill had passed as written, the result might have only been to delay a few hundred thousand mortgage foreclosures for a few months.
The housing market is still crashing. Millions of borrowers will soon be stuck with negative equity, which means it will make more sense for them to send in their keys and walk away than it will to keep up their payments. All the moreso when the cheap teaser rates end, the numbers of which haven't even peaked out yet.
FYI - in Canada, less than 5% of mortgages are subprime (versus 25% in the US). The real estate market is starting to weaken here, as it is in the UK and many other countries. But teaser-rates and a lot of the other gimmicks that inflated house prices in the US are illegal in Canada. So it didn't become a speculative market here, as in so many US cities, even though the Canadian economy has been great, personal debt is low and the savings rate is positive. I have American relatives with mortgages - the contrast between what is happening in Canada vs. Bushland is sobering and scary.
"Maverick though he may be ..." Fineman is too much of a narrative-junky to let go of that myth. Pathetic.
Although I will be the first to agree that McCain is a bastard for hiring another bastard (Phil Gramm) I sort of disagree that Phil Gramm is at the "heart" of the housing bubble collapse and the ensuing "mortgage foreclosure crisis"...
Phil Gramm was just a lobbyist at the time and never had or will have any oversite over the Federal Reserve...(the fed is the heart)
as a matter of fact nobody (in our elected govt) has any real power over the Federal Reserve Inc.
(Greenspan and Burnbanke anwer to no one) !
Perfect.
tr @ 10:
Bank of Crooks and Criminals International
Jo @ 18:
I'll bite. Stalin???
This is actually an old story, though yes, an important one. Guess old Keith got tired of beating up on the Senator from NY and decided to try a Texan for a change. Looks like Howard Fineman got so excited over the old story that he fluffed his hair out of whack while slicking on that shoe polish he wears up there.
Unfrakingbelievable.
Lets not forget that McCain has a history of being involved in the financial ruin of American. Keating 5, anyone?
milquetoast @ 36:
I'm pretty sure when they make those comments about Gramm they are referring to...
"In 1999, the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, which McCain voted for, broke down the decades-old wall separating commercial banks, heavily regulated… from the wild and woolly world of investment banking… a wall erected in 1933 to prevent a repeat… of the Great Depression."
The 1933 law was the Glass-Steagall Act -- which came out of the expensive lessons that were learned from the Great Depression.
The fascinating thing is that it took these greedy bastards such a short time to create such a huge clusterfuck -- that is such a short time after the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act passed (and signed, by Clinton.)
I just hope that the fool McCain continues to surround himself with more fucking fools like Gramm Cracker...yes, while he was a Senator from Texas, he was originally from Georgia.
Let me see, who took over his seat in the Senate? Was it the only guy that may be even stupider than the GrammCracker, Cornyn?
Blozzy Says
"Lets not forget that McCain has a history of being involved in the financial ruin of American. Keating 5, anyone?"
hey let's not forget Neil Bush........can the moonies be far behind?
I could sit here and spout off a litany of intellectual, rational arguments on why this is such a horrible thing....but as a texan....I can safely say Gramm is one of the biggest assholes in the universe.
Ok I get that Gramm was a former Lobbyist for the obviously corrupt UBS. But the real question that Olbermann should have looked into was....Who is UBS supporting now?
McCain UBS AG related donations $93,815
Obama UBS AG related donations $364,806
http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/contrib.php?cycle=2008&cid=N00009638
hmmm those corrupt real estate types do seem to gravitate towards Obama don't they.
mccain is so done. the next six months might actually be fun.
Nothing from the mouth of Olbermann is worth much. How is this even a story?
McCain opposes regulation of the mortgage industry.
And - shock - he employs consultants who agree with him! Some of them are lobbyists!
Corruption!
This is very old news. I'm surprised it took so long to break...
it'sa always OK if you are repug.
Blozzy @ 42:
Hopefully Obama will have the balls to bring up McCains economic retardation in any debate. Another stone for the hammer.
ALL Republicans are Shameless Greedy Dicks. But oh so sweet how Mother Nature pounds Texas almost daily. The great purification has only just begun...and the most polluted Texas is first!
Our Confusing Economy, Explained (audio) http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89338743
Michael Greenberger is a professor at the University of Maryland School of Law and the director of the University's Center for Health and Homeland Security. Greenberger is a former Director of the Division of Trading and Markets at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. He has also testified before congress two or three times a year for several years.
"Gramm was the biggest of the big guns behind the 1999 repeal of the banking regulations — the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act — which was officially called The Financial Services Modernization Act."
In this highly educational interview, Mr. Greenberger discusses how Phil Gramm led repeal of Depression-era banking regulations:
Phil Gramm and Gas Price Increases
Pres. Bill Clinton signed the law the created the Enron Loophole — Commodity Futures Modernization Act (CFMA), December 2000. John McCain's financial advisor, Phil Gramm and his wife Wendy Gramm were the main individuals behind the passage of the CFMA. Wendy Gramm held the highest position at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC). A few weeks after the CFMA passed, Wendy Gramm went to work at Enron for 1.85 million dollars.
From an NYT article in 2001 after Enron:
Ken Lay, Enron courts senior Treasury Official
Mr. Lay also had powerful friends. He recruited Wendy L. Gramm, the top commodities regulator in the administration of President Bush's father and the wife of Senator Phil Gramm, Republican of Texas, to serve on Enron's board in 1993. The appointment came just five weeks after Ms. Gramm helped push through a ruling at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission that exempted many energy contracts from regulation.
Good report on McCain's economic policy - just as dangerous as Bush.
Speaking of Presidential wannabes, when is Keith's Special Comment from Friday night - on Hillary's evoking RFK as a justification for staying in a race she's not going to win - going to be made available?
As recently as Dec. 31st of last year, still working for Swiss bankers specifically to help kill the “Emergency Home Ownership and Mortgage Equity Protection Act” and the “Helping Families Save Their Homes in Bankruptcy Act,” a bill that would have let bankruptcy judges adjust mortgage terms so American families facing foreclosure could repay their loans, and keep their homes.
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Homes are way overpriced. People facing foreclosure are living in a debt trap that is eating up their income.
20% down and 36% debt to income is the norm. Lending standards need to be tightened, which means prices need to drop, so that houses can be affordable again. Gimmick legislation will not accomplish that.
With oil at 130 dollars a barrel and threatening to march higher, people with zero down, paycheck to paycheck mortgage payments, cannot afford them, even if given new terms and 20% equity- which comes out of someone elses pocket, maybe yours, as CDO's lose value.
It was a bubble. It must and will deflate, as all bubbles do. A mortgage equity protection act is bound to fail.
What goes up, also goes down. Try to prevent it and consequences will appear somewhere else. As it is, banks are trying to hide bad debt off the books. The bad debt is still there, however. Pretending that it isn't won't make it go away.
This is the "narrative" that they want us to believe, that if we had only tweaked the system JUST A LITTLE BIT, then the tragedy could've been averted.
And it's working on all you liberal zombies, because now it has a Republican face attached.
It's so obvious, that it's TRANSPARENT.
Make no mistake, this crisis, which was CAUSED by the Federal Reserve, could not have been averted by givning the Federal Reserve MORE POWER.
THAT was the problem in the first place.
And it couldn't have been fixed by a few regulations.
But they give you Phil Gramm to gnash your teeth at for two minutes today, and your Emmanuel Goldstein fix has been satisfied. Move on to the NEXT distraction.
Masterful! I am proud of Olbermann and Obama. They are certainly tying that K-street corruption and sub-prime fiasco Albatross around McCain's neck.
By the way, what is it about Texas, what with creating hydrocephalic greedy disaster-blunderbusses like the Shrub, Gramm, Delay, etc, etc?
"Can you imagine the outrage from the right and McCain’s media if Gramm worked for a Democratic candidate’s campaign?"
Damn liberal media.
Ok so Gramm was a Lobbyist for UBS, the question Olbermann should have looked into was who is UBS backing now?
McCain UBS AG related donations $93,815
Obama UBS AG related donations $364,806
SRC: opensecrets.org
Gramm invoved in shady dealings and corruption ? No , you don't say ! Anyone know of a "clean" Republican these days ?
Texas = oil
Phil Gramm = Texas
George Bush = Texas
Phil Gramm = Enron disaster
While Texas Governor, George Bush knew Phil Gram
McCain Defends 'Enron Loophole' May 20, 2008
http://www.countercurrents.org/leopold20058.htm
Ah yes Phil Gramm. The man that brought us Enron and blackouts in Cali, now brings us the mortgage debacle..Jesus H. Christ.
I FUCK TEXAS
Republicans, turning everything they touch into shit since 1854.
~~ It's Vegas, baby. ~~
a snippet from a 39:07 NPR interview: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89338743 - 'Our Confusing Economy, Explained:'
'it's as if a bunch of las vegas bookies started taking bets and never bothered to write them down or record them or as you know frequently a bookie will try and have a balance book so that if it loses one side of the bet, it will cover by another side and they make their money on the commissions or the vigor, as they say, i believe, here these banks did not bother to hedge themselves so, you know, we would have been better off if las vegas had handled this operation than bear stearns handling it.'
this 39:07 minute NPR interview, 'Our Confusing Economy, Explained' with Michael Greenburger, former [1997] Director of the Division of Trading and Markets at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission in that capacity, he was responsible for supervising exchange traded futures and derivatives. He also served on the Steering Committee of the President's Working Group on Financial Markets, and as a member of the International Organization of Securities Commissions' Hedge Fund Task Force. He has frequently been asked to speak both in the media and at academic gatherings about issues pertaining to financial regulation, and has appeared on the ABC Evening News, The Jim Lehrer News Hour, and C-Span to discuss financial issues arising out of the Enron, Arthur Anderson, and WorldCom, Refco and Amaranth failures. he breaks it down to its essence for the financial mess we face:
'between the two pieces of legislation, the more famous one [repeal of Glass-Steagall], which was eliminating the distinction between investment banks and commercial banks was the least problematic. the lesser known piece of legislation that phil gramm sponsored, [Commodity Futures Modernization Act - this act also included the infamous "Enron On-line" loophole], which had no hearings in the senate, no senate report, came up on the floor, was really just a complete surprise to everybody is this deregulation of these instruments the credit default swaps, OTC derivatives, etc., my basic view is i don't care who the institution is, whether it is a bank, an investment bank, a hedge fund, a private investor, what i care about is that these are toxic investments that have been deregulated without any forethought at all except forethought by wall street. warren buffet famously said that these OTC derivatives, credit default swaps are the financial equivalent of weapons of mass destruction.'
the scariest aspect to me is that is mccain is relying on the architect of this train wreck, phil gramm, as is chief economic advisor.
and, pray tell, who signed the gramm-leach-bliley act into law in november of 1999 with the secretary of the treasury, bob rubin, leaving two [2] days later to join citigroup and the gramm commodities act in december of 2000, hmmmm?
foreclose on his house and see how he likes it!
fastfeat @ 60:
Somewhere, Miss Molly Ivins is rolling around in her grave because she can't be here to write for us.
The fix is on and millions more Americans will lose their homes if McCain get's in office.
What's a shame is our troops are dying everyday but Obama says the following to Hillary:
Obama responded: “Well, first of all, I became chairman of this committee at the beginning of this campaign, at the beginning of 2007. So it is true that we haven’t had oversight hearings on Afghanistan
Yes Obama was appointed Senate Foreign Relations Sub Committee Chair for European Affairs for NATO and Afghanstan. But he's never had a meeting in 18 months because he's been to busy running for President and helping his Father's country of Kenya. No wonder he doesn't know anything about what's going on with the Foreign Countries. What's sad is our troops need help and are dying everyday while the Freshman Senator is to busy.
Now how is it that McCain can't do his job or show up to pass bills and Obama is to busy to have meeting that could save thousands of soldier lives, but Hillary does both show up for her Senate job and run for President. I guess American would rather has Obama continue to be busy as President while thousands of soldiers die or McCain who can't remember one day from the next. What's a shame is how these guys talked during Memorial Day knowing they could really care less about our soldiers just geting in the White House to stay the Bush course.
The dems would not listen to Flim-Flam Gramm so he changes party and he becomes the corporate whore he always wanted to be.
McCain-Gramm.........soul mates for life.
and here is why the media is broken:
Howard Fineman refers to McCain as a "Maverick" twice, and then follows this little callsign by giving explicit examples of how he's falling in line with republican deregulation & k-street culture.
"Maverick though he may be in spirit"? WTF does that mean?
How does Fineman know that "it pains him, it bothers him [McCain]" that McCain has to go the corporate route to run? What a f****n joke.
Maverick and a reformer? McCain?
McCain is a Washington insider. Period. He is bought and paid for. He owes everyone favors including Bushco.
When they call those favors in McCain will repay in full. Vote the McCain Bum out!
Bush will want McCain to sweep all of his crimes under the rug and McCain will do it.
This is "breaking?" I heard about this on NPR a month or two ago. I was wondering why no one was talking about it.
POdVet Says:
Ok so Gramm was a Lobbyist for UBS, the question Olbermann should have looked into was who is UBS backing now?
McCain UBS AG related donations $93,815
Obama UBS AG related donations $364,806
SRC: opensecrets.org
All this shows is that McCain can be bought a lot cheaper than Obama.
neverbeenfooled @ 76:
Obama's donations come from the cafeteria workers and the latrine cleaners at UBS. McSame's donations come from the Board room.
Olberman has gone to la la land. I watched him regularly a few months ago but he is becoming outrageous.
His acting role of "righteous indignation" especially about the Hillary Robert Kennedy statement was far out there. I think Chris Matthews is giving his some MSNBC kool aid. He has drastically changed for the worst in the past two to three months. No fairness. He sounds just like the other MSNBC commentators....for a brief moment he was a breath of fresh air however, he has joined the pack in bashing Hillary.
Too many people are noticing it now. His ratings are going down and should. He had a good thing going when he was not so impressed with his cohorts at MSNBC. Maybe someone got to him and told him to join the team or get out.
U hear that ?? Sounded like another wheel falling off the Crooked Crap Express.
All nit-picking aside, it is the overwhelming pattern of arrogance, greed, and corruption from the cadre of folks dancing between our government and the military-industrial-financial complex that is at the heart of this. With a chicken-hearted media, it is going to take sustained and determined outreach from the grassroots bloggers and other to bring this all up front. Olberman may be reaching the breaking point but so would any of us trying break through the wall of silence that has crippled what was supposed to be "the fourth estate" that has completely abrogated its responsibility to hold government accountable to us - the victims of these vultures.
neverbeenfooled @ 76:
Neverbeenfooled? What contradictory moniker. Never mind the lying, stupid, hypocrite "maverick" McShit, you Republican assholes NEVER accept responsibility when you're busted. This time the cowardly deflect bullshit blame game won't work.
Comrade Rou @ 6:
he certainly is that. He's gone from being a maverick to being even worse than Bush. Whatta way to attract voters, McClueless!
The architect of the whole mortgage meltdown running McCain's campaign!
Your house in foreclosure...$300,000 dollars
The economic losses due to foreclosure and bad bundling of loans....$trillions
McCain, the anti-lobbyist, having the man most responsible for the meltdown writing his economic policy for him...priceless
notice how Fineman still gets it wrong - he acknowledges McCain is up to his eyeballs in lobbyist filth, but still excuses it all as a necessity of campaigning -
' I'm sure he doesn't like it one bit, but it's what he has to do . . .'
completely missing the nature of McCain's relationship to these pigs - he's had them all along
"Phil Gramm would lie on credit even if he could tell the truth for free."
I don't remember who said that, but I read it during the Bush I reign, and it stands in my mind as everything you'd need to know about Phil Gramm.
Joanie and Sherry, such contemptresses! Olberman should do even more of this stuff. The left can sit back quietly and be all superior to the right and their bloviating hateboxes and continue to eat their dust, or they can play ball and whip every little scandal into damaging press for McCain. I am surprised you deigned to lift your haughty fingers to the keyboard, so unamused art thou.
Don't forget Gramm's involvement in Enron. Not to mention his wife's tenure on the Enron board. They pioneered the modern Ponzi scheme to funnel away billions and billions of dollars.
Don't forget the Keating Five from the Reagan Era. McCain was involved in that.
Next we'll have the Graham Five and McCain will be involved in that.
Chico Hussein @ 77:
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Those cafeteria workers must be very well paid at UBS.