Bush admin. about to give another blow to the American taxpayer.
http://time-blog.com/curious_capitalist/2008/09/now_we_get_to_see_what_paulson.htmlBack in July, Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson asked Congress to trust him to deal with the troubles at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. He got his way, in the form of legislation that gave him more a less a blank check to bail out and reorganize the giant mortgage lenders. "The more flexibility I have, the more confidence that gives to the market, the less likelihood the authorities will be used and the better for the taxpayers," he told TIME then.
Well, it turns out it didn't give the market enough confidence to avoid a bailout altogether. Investors, who had bid the companies' stocks up after Congress acted in July, soured on them again about a week ago. More ominously, there were signs that foreign central banks, until now big buyers of Fannie's and Freddie's bonds and mortgage-backed securities, were beginning to sell.