"Do facts matter in presidential race?" By Thomas Sowell
Abraham Lincoln said, "You can fool all the people some of the time and some of the people all the time, but you can't fool all the people all the time"
Unfortunately, the future of this country, as well as the fate of the western world, depends on how many people can be fooled on election day, just a few weeks from now.
Right now, the polls indicate that a whole lot of people are being fooled a whole lot of the time.
The current financial crisis has propelled Barack Obama back into a substantial lead over John McCain--which is astonishing in view of which man and which party had the most to do with bringing on the crisis.
It raises the question: "Do facts matter? Or is Obama's rhetoric and the media's spin enough to make facts irrelevant?"
Fact Number One: It was liberal Democrats, led by Sen. Christopher Dodd and US Rep Barney Frank, who for years--including the present year--denied that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were taking big risks that could lead to a financial crisis.
It was Dodd, Frank and other liberal Democrats who for years refused requests from the Bush administration to set up an agency to regulate Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
It was liberal Democrats, again led by Dodd and Frank, who for years pushed for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to go even further in promoting subprime mortgage loans, which are at the heart of today's financial crisis.
Alan Greenspan warned them four years ago. So did the Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers to the president. So did Bush's secretary of the Treasury, five years ago.
Yet, today, what are we hearing? That is was the Bush administration's "right-wing ideology" of "deregulation" that set the stage for the financial crisis. Do facts matter?
We also hear that it is the free market that is to blame. But the facts show that it was the government that pressured financial institutions in general to lend to subprime borrowers, with such things as the Community Reinvestment Act and, later, threats of legal action by then-Attorney General Janet Reno if the feds did not like the statistics on who was getting loans and who wasn't.
Is that the free market? Or do facts matter?
Then there is the question of being against the greed of CEOs and for "the people." Franklin Raines made $90 million while he was head of Fannie Mae and mismanaging that institution into crisis.
Who in Congress defended Raines? Liberal Democrats, including Maxine Waters and the Congressional Black Caucus, at least one of who referred to the "lynching" of Raines, as if it was racist to hold him to the same standard as white CEOs.
Even after he was deposed as head of Fannie Mae, Raines was consulted this year by the Obama campaign for his advice on housing.
The tie between Obama and Raines is not all one-way. Obama has been the second-largest recepient of Fannie Mae's financial contributions, right after Dodd.
But ties between Obama and Raines? Not if you read the mainstream media.
Facts don't matter much politically if they are not reported.
The media are not alone in keeping the facts from the public. Republicans, for reasons unknown, don't seem to know what to counterattack. They deserve to lose.
But the country does not deserve to be put in the hands of a glib and cocky know-it-all who has accomplished absolutely nothing beyond the advancement of his own career with rhetoric and who has for years allied himself with a succession of people who have openly expressed their hatred of America."
If you're thinking this article is just racism, let me point out that the author himself is black. If you would like to know more about the terrorist association or the pastor/mentor who causes great concern, research Bill Ayers and Jeremiah Wright. If you are wondering why you've never heard anything about the dangerous side of Senator Obama, I encourage you to get away from the mainstream media. On CNN tune into Glenn Beck and on FoxNews tune into Hannity & Colmes and the O'Reilly Factor. You may amazed at what you haven't heard.
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