Do NY Times Reporters Read the NY Times?
21 December 2008
Editor, The New York Times
229 West 43rd St.
New York, NY 10036
To the Editor:
Your front-page report on George W. Bush's role in the housing crisis is stunningly inaccurate ("White House Philosophy Stoked Mortgage Bonfire," December 21). Had your reporters read "Fannie Mae Eases Credit To Aid Mortgage Lending," a report appearing in your pages on September 30, 1999,* they would have found this fact that contradicts their allegation that government efforts to artificially and dangerously promote home-ownership began with the current administration: "Fannie Mae, the nation's biggest underwriter of home mortgages, has been under increasing pressure from the Clinton Administration to expand mortgage loans among low and moderate income people."
And your reporters would have found also this prescient warning: "'From the perspective of many people, including me, this is another thrift industry growing up around us,' said Peter Wallison a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. 'If they fail, the government will have to step up and bail them out the way it stepped up and bailed out the thrift industry.'"
Your reporters are either lazy or partisan or both.
Sincerely,
Donald J. Boudreaux
Chairman, Department of Economics
George Mason University
* http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9c0DE7DB153EF933A0575AC0A96F958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all
Editor, The New York Times
229 West 43rd St.
New York, NY 10036
To the Editor:
Your front-page report on George W. Bush's role in the housing crisis is stunningly inaccurate ("White House Philosophy Stoked Mortgage Bonfire," December 21). Had your reporters read "Fannie Mae Eases Credit To Aid Mortgage Lending," a report appearing in your pages on September 30, 1999,* they would have found this fact that contradicts their allegation that government efforts to artificially and dangerously promote home-ownership began with the current administration: "Fannie Mae, the nation's biggest underwriter of home mortgages, has been under increasing pressure from the Clinton Administration to expand mortgage loans among low and moderate income people."
And your reporters would have found also this prescient warning: "'From the perspective of many people, including me, this is another thrift industry growing up around us,' said Peter Wallison a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. 'If they fail, the government will have to step up and bail them out the way it stepped up and bailed out the thrift industry.'"
Your reporters are either lazy or partisan or both.
Sincerely,
Donald J. Boudreaux
Chairman, Department of Economics
George Mason University
* http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9c0DE7DB153EF933A0575AC0A96F958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all
Posted by Don Boudreaux on
Monday May 18, 2009 at 10:15am