Meet Frank Raines and Daniel Mudd- All the King's Horses and All the King's Men, Couldn't Put Fannie Together Again

I love a no cops but plenty of robbers story- just like the next guy. Grammar be damned.

It has been at least 3 years since the Wall Street collapse. This country has yet to prosecute one thieving- fraud committing banker and put them in jail. The government managed to shake down Angelo Mozilo of Countrywide fame for about 69 million, 20 million of it paid for by Bank of America. If I remember correctly, that only had to do with his insider trading habits. It left Mozilo with his freedom and as near as I can tell, a net worth of about 400 million- but that's just a swag.

After reading a ZeroHedge story, I began to smolder just a bit.  http://www.zerohedge.com/article/government-pretend-it-will-prosecute-wall-street#comment-901773

I find it fascinating that our government is finally thinking about prosecuting the bad guys. Coincidentally, Dear Leader is about a year from having to gear up his mighty re-election apparatus. Now suddenly- it has occurred to someone that there might have been some alleged wrong doing in the greatest banking fraud the world has ever seen? How rich is that?

On a ZH comment board I plundered this name. Read the background of a guy that somehow managed to avoid criminal prosecution...http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franklin_Raines

Frank Raines was the head of Fannie Mae in 1999. He recommended loans to people "a notch" below credit worthy. A "notch" is apparently one of those terms left open to interpretation. He did a bunch of other crooked things according to Wikipedia and was allowed to escape with a slap on the wrist, the usual fines (which someone else paid) and some other obscure and undisclosed punishment. It smacks of Angelo Mozilo and every other connected piece of garbage that has been allowed to escape by our government after shaking them down for some fine money. Of course and not surprisingly, Mozilo's name would pop up here as well. Frank Raines name might have been lost on me. Except that...

Raines worked as Director for the Office of Budget and Management under Bill Clinton. (That impeached guy who acts as President every once in awhile when Obama has important things to do.) Frank springboarded from that gig into the much more lucrative Fannie Mae business. Raines got 3 million dollars worth of sweetheart loans from that Countrywide crook Mozilo. Mozilo used investor money to make loans or bribes- call them what you will- the terms of which have never been disclosed. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Countrywide_financial_political_loan_scandal  As near as I can tell, Raines made 115 million dollars while working for Fannie Mae. Not only did Raines pave the way for all of those crappy loans, but he groomed his successor to do more of the same. Daniel Mudd enlarged and expanded the crappy loan making program and eventually got canned- but not until he managed to get away with 80 million bucks and left taxpayers with that smoldering wreck, Fannie Mae. Mudd didn't get his severance pay. That's harsh. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Mudd

Apparently, the Obama campaign sought out the expertise of Frank Raines after he was long gone. Since Raines appears to be an expert at so many levels, from training talented people to obtaining very agreeable mortgages, it is difficult to speculate on what the substance of those conversation(s) might have been about.

It has cost taxpayers 24 million dollars to DEFEND Raines. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/24/AR2011012406425.html

Of particular note and fascination is that Raines is a Harvard grad and a Rhodes Scholar. Proving once again that moral/ethical conduct and education- can be mutually exclusive concepts. One last tearful story about Raines. He almost comes off like a victim. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/07/15/AR2008071502827.html

So how much have the reckless and careless decisions of these two morons cost US taxpayers? How's a cool 1/2 trillion sound? The carnage is not over yet. That they are walking around free men with all that bonus money, facilitated by an indifferent and crony government, defies belief. One wonders what influence these two had on Freddie Mac. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-06-13/fannie-freddie-fix-expands-to-160-billion-with-worst-case-at-1-trillion.html

Let me put this into perspective. All of the losses, of all of the property type criminals, in all of our prisons combined- probably cannot match the loss here. That includes Bernie. Make sure you send in your tax check on time this year. The government needs the money for Frank's mounting legal bills.

Comments

Anonymous said…
1/2 trillion dollars? That's a little more than chump change. My guess is DOJ will now open investigations so that when Holder called before Issa's committee, he will be able to respond to question by saying that he can not comment on on-going investigations. Could he get away with that?

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