Bondzilla Eats The Church
The Market Ticker ® - Commentary on The Capital Markets
Posted 2010-02-23 16:04
by Karl Denninger
in Bonds
Ignore this thread
Bondzilla Eats The Church
 

Well, maybe not yet, but....

Today, Members of Congress have an opportunity to set out on the road to recovery by agreeing to co-sponsor the Accurate Accounting of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac Act. Authored by Representative Scott Garrett (R., N.J.), the bill would require that taxpayers receive an honest accounting of their exposure to the failed housing behemoths.

The Obama Administration has refused to provide such an accounting in its official budget, which is indefensible under traditional rules for government-sponsored entities. As the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) pointed out last month, since the government placed Fan and Fred in conservatorship and Treasury took controlling ownership stakes in 2008, "those actions make Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac part of the government and imply that their operations should be reflected in the federal budget."

Of course it's indefensible.

But heh, this is nothing new.  The biggest problem with these "factories" of housing BS games is that their balance sheets are about as transparent as a piece of plywood, they have a documented history of cooking their financial reports and they're raw political tools of people like Bwarney Frank.

I called for this when the government first provided "support" to these "institutions."  Frankly, they need to be shut down and put into run-off - it's the only thing that makes sense.  Those who argue that we "won't have a housing industry without them" are simply wrong - we will have a housing industry - a sound one, based on sound credit fundamentals, instead of a serial bubble machine that our government attempts to keep inflated even though it has already popped!

But short of that we must have transparency and accountability, and the only way to accomplish that is for the GSEs to be formally placed "on sheet" where we can all see exactly how ugly things really are.

Whether this provokes Bondzilla into waking up is an option question - frankly, I'm stunned that he hasn't already stepped on a few buildings.  Nevertheless no institution, including our government, deserves to get away with raw misdirection and outright accounting fraud.

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User Info Bondzilla Eats The Church in forum [Market-Ticker]
Medicdan
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Green
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I would be willing to bet this will not happen under the rule of Pelosi, Reid, and Obama.

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Timbo
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the holy mountain
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http://mises.org/books/thisbreadismine.p....
Sushihorn
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Karl
Bondzilla's been pretty busy across the pond.

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smiley

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I don't care if it makes sense -- only if it makes money. -- Me
Bank (n): See scam, fraud and theft. Eat a bankster -- they're low-carb.
What part of "shall not be infringed" was unclear?
Scrood
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Welcome back, Rev. Bondzilla!

Inline

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CTRL-GALT-DELETE
Muscleknight
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Will it backfire on BOB?
Inline

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Randy123
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Bravo for Scott who I spoke to personally in March of '08 after Bear Stearns and told him how disgusted I was. Even then he seemed to grasp the slippery slope.

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China is the Enemy. Wake Up.

New Normal. Same As The Old Awful.
Eleua
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.

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Vegasradar
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Funny, I read more into this than simply money—

Why do I get the feeling that an audit of FRE & FMN would generate a lot of CONgressional "honey's" for BUBBA

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Genesis
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smiley

Muscle and El...

Vegas, you bet. A nice audit should be, oh, about right now.

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I don't care if it makes sense -- only if it makes money. -- Me
Bank (n): See scam, fraud and theft. Eat a bankster -- they're low-carb.
What part of "shall not be infringed" was unclear?
Goforbroke
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I was googling around today and found an article which estimated that the foregone property taxes on churches in the US amounted to $100 billion annually. (Didn't record the link ...I'll do it again if anyone really wants it.) Not to mention income tax, sales tax ...

Also, on average, 87% of the funds received by any church are used by the church itself (as opposed to being given to charities/causes).

No comment.

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Cprince
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This forum is great...I really don't know where I would get the truth about what is going on and what should be happening...better stop I'm getting misty eyed...thanks...

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IN
Jaydawg
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Green
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Goforbroke--Sad but true, the church I attend is deeply in debt be it mostly due to their mortgage and buildings that were expanded during the bubble years.
Vegansharky
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You guys are fun.
VS

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Montenegro
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Vegan - more than fun - Gen nukes China for being better at the game USA thought it was good at. Hell goes where it said it would (but lies to the world: situation normal) love and flowers to all slaves!

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Critter
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iowa
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does anyone ever get the feeling that government has taken over the role of the mafia after realizing the most profitable commodity next to prostitution,booze,and drugs is the american taxpayer?
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inline










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Icanhasbailout
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Imaginationland
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I got this one covered!

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Antone
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I LOVE the bondzilla ****!

Muscle, smiley!

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As if anything has changed:

Wir sind gefickt.
Burya_rubenstein
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Misleading title. Leads one to believe the ticker is about the RC Church doing financial stupid/dishonest ****. (Could be they are, but the ticker doesn't mention it.)
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