La Fed mantendría su rumbo tras el rescate de Fannie Mae y Freddie Mac
Por Sudeep Reddy y Jon Hilsenrath
El rescate orquestado por el gobierno de Estados Unidos de las dos mayores firmas hipotecarias de ese país, Fannie Mae y Freddie Mac, no cambiará el curso de la política monetaria de la Reserva Federal.
| Nuestra reportera Heidi Moore habla con Dennis Berman sobre quiénes se han beneficiado y quienes perdieron con el rescate de Fannie Mae y Freddie Mac por parte del gobierno. |
En medio de una tormenta en los mercados de crédito que se sigue agravando y un panorama inflacionario más positivo, parece cada vez más probable que la Fed opte por mantener en 2% su tasa de referencia hasta entrado el próximo año.
Incluso antes de que el gobierno asumiera el control de los dos gigantes hipotecarios, las expectativas de que la Fed aumentara las tasas ya se habían moderado. La caída de los precios de las materias primas, el aumento del desempleo en EE.UU., el repunte del dólar y la desaceleración de la economía global les han dado un respiro a las autoridades que estaban sintiendo la presión de subir las tasas para contener la inflación. Su próxima reunión está programada para la semana entrante. "Parece claro que los riesgos inflacionarios se han disipado un poco en los últimos meses a medida que los precios de las materias primas han ido bajando desde sus máximos", dijo la semana pasada en un discurso Janet Yellen, presidenta de la Fed de San Francisco y miembro sin derecho a voto del Comité de Mercado Abierto, órgano de decisión de la Fed. Además, añadió que espera que "tanto la inflación general como la subyacente desciendan en 2009 a un nivel mucho más moderado, ligeramente por encima del 2%".
Dean Maki, economista jefe para EE.UU. de Barclays Capital, dice que la mejora del cuadro inflacionario "los tranquiliza en el sentido de que podrán mantener la pausa".
Con calma
Mientras los temores de inflación han amainado, la tormenta financiera se ha intensificado, otorgándoles a los funcionarios de la Fed un incentivo extra para no subir las tasas de interés súbitamente. Las autoridades temen que las turbulencias financieras restrinjan aún más los préstamos de los bancos y eleven la presión sobre una economía ya debilitada. La Fed tampoco está segura de cuándo se normalizará la principal fuente de todos estos problemas, es decir la caída en los precios de las viviendas y el aumento de las cesaciones de pagos.
![[Fed]](http://s.wsj.net/public/resources/images/OA-AW673_wsjamd_NS_20080908202740.jpg)
El rescate de Fannie Mae y Freddie Mac, respaldado por el presidente de la Fed, Ben Bernanke, podría acelerar la recuperación del mercado inmobiliario. Las tensiones que imperan en los mercados de crédito han dejado las tasas de las hipotecas de tasa fija a 30 años en el mismo nivel que hace un año, pese a que la Fed ha bajado su tasa de referencia en forma considerable desde su reciente máximo de 5,25%, alcanzado en septiembre del año pasado. Si las tasas hipotecarias bajan debido a la intervención gubernamental, más dueños de casas podrían entrar al mercado de bienes raíces y acabar con el declive de precios.
| Kathy Lien, directora de investigación de divisas de GFT Forex, explica por qué el rescate de las firmas hipotecarias es positivo para el dólar. |
Las altas tasas hipotecarias son una de muchas señales de que los recortes de tasas de la Fed no han logrado traducirse en menores costos de financiamiento para que los consumidores y las empresas. La mayoría de los funcionarios de la Fed cree que el hecho de que las condiciones del crédito no hayan mejorado evidencia que el banco central tiene carta blanca para dejar su tasa de referencia en los niveles actuales.
Los expertos pronostican que la actividad económica se debilitará en el segundo semestre y no empezará a recuperarse sino hasta el año que viene y a un ritmo muy lento. El último salto del desempleo, de 5,7% en julio a 6,1% en agosto, puso de manifiesto cómo las condiciones se han deteriorado mucho más de lo que anticipaba la Fed. En junio, las proyecciones de los analistas para la tasa de desempleo del cuarto trimestre pasaron de 5,5% a 5,8%. Sus próximas previsiones serán publicadas en octubre. Aun así, muchos representantes del banco central esperan que su próximo paso sea un alza de tasas, no un recorte. Pese a que los precios de los commodities han caído, la inflación subyacente, que excluye los alimentos y la energía, continúa ascendiendo. Además, no está claro que nuevos recortes de tasas impulsarán la economía, dado que un año de recortes no ha reducido de forma significativa las tasas de otros préstamos, como las hipotecas.
El gobierno cubano sube el precio de la gasolina
Coincidiendo con el arrasador paso del huracán Ike a través de la isla, los cubanos recibieron el lunes otra mala noticia: la subida de hasta el 87 por ciento en los precios de los combustibles en los servicentros nacionales.
En una nota aparecida en la prensa oficial, el gobierno cubano anunció el incremento del costo de los distintos tipos de gasolina y el diésel que se venden en moneda convertible en el país, atribuyendo la decisión a gastos de adquisición del combustible que resultan "insostenibles'' para la economía interna.
La medida entró en vigor a la medianoche del 8 de septiembre, aunque el comunicado del Ministerio de Finanzas y Precios no informa sobre la magnitud específica de los aumentos.
Fuentes consultadas el lunes tras visitar servicentros en La Habana, confirmaron a El Nuevo Herald que los aumentos son los siguientes, atendiendo a que un peso convertible (CUC) se cotiza a $1.20:
* El litro de gasolina normal aumentó de 0.65 a 1.15 CUC, lo que representa un alza del 77 por ciento.
* La gasolina de máxima calidad (especial) varió de 0.95 a 1.50 CUC, para un 58 por ciento.
* El diésel subió de 0,75 a 1,40 CUC, para un 87 por ciento.
Comparado con los precios de la gasolina en Estados Unidos, significaría un desembolso de unos $6 para obtener un galón del combustible. El precio actual de la gasolina regular en los servicentros estadounidenses promedia unos $3.70.
El anuncio gubernamental en Cuba marca el segundo incremento significativo de precios de productos en menos de seis meses, luego que el pasado mayo las tiendas estatales dispusieron incrementos de hasta el 18 por ciento de las mercancías que se ofertan en divisas.
La explicación a los ciudadanos recuerda que desde el 2005 los precios del petróleo casi se triplicaron y "Cuba no es ajena a estos efectos''.
El comunicado agrega que los 158,000 barriles de petróleo que consume diariamente el país, costaron en el 2007 unos $8.7 millones, mientras que este año habrá que desembolsar $11.6 millones más cada día para mantener los mismos niveles de consumo. El argumento contiene las mismas cifras que había empleado el vicepresidente Carlos Lage a comienzos de junio, cuando adelantó que el gobierno reduciría o aplazaría las inversiones como consecuencia del aumento en los precios internacionales de los alimentos y combustibles.
"Si en el presente año se produjeran ventas en servicentros iguales a las del 2007, a los precios vigentes desde el 2005 (...) se generarían pérdidas por 388 millones de CUC e implicaría un subsidio estatal del 36 por ciento, lo cual no es sostenible para la economía del país'', señaló la nota gubernamental.
Pero la medida anunciada quedó abierta a futuros cambios, pues el Ministerio de Finanzas y Precios aclaró que actualizará trimestralmente el costo del combustible "en correspondencia con las variaciones de precios en el mercado mundial''.
Sin embargo, los expertos consideran que la medida no traerá inmediatamente la compensación monetaria que prevé el gobierno cubano.
"El aumento de precios del combustible va a tener un impacto menor en los ingresos del Estado, pues el mayor consumidor de petróleo en Cuba es el propio gobierno'', opinó el ex ejecutivo petrolero Jorge R. Piñón, investigador del Centro del Centro de Política Hemisférica de la Universidad de Miami.
Las cifras totales del consumo de combustible en Cuba indican que el 63 por ciento corresponde a petróleo industrial, empleado en el sector eléctrico y la esfera productiva. Un 22 por ciento lo ocupa el diésel que consumen mayormente camiones, trenes y demás vehículos de propiedad estatal y sólo el 6 por ciento pertenece al uso de gasolina.
A pesar del incremento en el valor de la gasolina, el lunes fue bastante activo en numerosos servicentros de la capital, donde los preparativos por la llegada de Ike al occidente cubano lanzaron a muchas personas a la calle en busca de combustible.
En el discurso del pasado 26 de julio, el gobernante Raúl Castro advirtió que los cubanos debían estar preparados para "no sólo recibir buenas noticias''.
"Por muy grandes que sean nuestros deseos de resolver cada problema, no podemos gastar más de lo que tenemos y para sacar el máximo de provecho es imprescindible ahorrar de todo, en primer lugar combustible'', aseguró el mandatario.
Cuba produce diariamente unos 75,000 barriles de petróleo y recibe unos 100,000 del intercambio comercial con Venezuela.
Policía política interroga a Araújo, ex senador colombiano
Las autoridades investigan si el ex ministro colombiano Alvaro Araújo Noguera, detenido la semana pasada en la ciudad occidental de Maracaibo, habría cometido algún delito en el país, informó el lunes el ministro de Relaciones Inte-
riores saliente.
Araújo Noguera, padre de la ex canciller colombiana María Consuelo Araújo, se mantenía prófugo desde hace año y medio luego que un tribunal de Colombia ordenó su detención para procesarlo por su supuesta participación en un secuestro en el 2002.
El ministro de Relaciones Interiores, Ramón Rodríguez Chacín, dijo en conferencia de prensa que el también ex congresista, de 75 años, fue apresado el 4 de septiembre en Maracaibo, estado de Zulia, y de allí fue trasladado a la sede de la policía política en Caracas, donde está siendo sometido a averiguaciones.
Rodríguez Chacín indicó que el detenido tiene ``un código rojo de Interpol, que significa aprehensión con fines de extradición''.
''Las autoridades colombianas deben proceder con los pasos del proceso para la extradición. Mientras tanto, las autoridades venezolanas están haciendo todas las investigaciones de inteligencia y las investigaciones procesales para determinar los delitos que pudo haber cometido en el país'', reiteró.
El ministro refirió que Araújo Noguera ``se sacó una cédula de transeúnte en 1996, pero no la renovó, se venció y perdió validez. Ahora la otra cédula, la que tiene actualmente, tampoco es válida, porque no se tramitó ante la Onidex (Oficina Nacional de Identificación y Extranjería) con los recaudos que exige la Ley''.
Rodríguez Chacín, quien anunció este lunes su renuncia al cargo, insistió que de determinarse que Araújo Noguera cometió un delito en Venezuela ''corresponderá a las autoridades judiciales venezolanas conocer esos delitos'', antes de enviarlo a Colombia.
Renuncia ministro del Interior de Venezuela
CARACAS --
El ministro de Relaciones Interiores, Ramón Rodríguez Chacín, anunció el lunes su renuncia al cargo argumentando razones "personales" e informó que será reemplazado por el segundo en ese despacho.Rodríguez Chacín, quien asumió el Ministerio del Interior a fines del año pasado mientras coordinaba el rescate de un grupo de rehenes de las FARC, declaró a la prensa que "por razones estrictamente personales puse mi cargo a la orden".
Rodríguez Chacín es un capitán de navío retirado y un estrecho colaborador del presidente Hugo Chávez desde los tiempos en que el mandatario encabezó, siendo un teniente coronel del Ejército, un fallido golpe en 1992. Durante su carrera militar, Rodríguez Chacín se desempeñó en el área de inteligencia.
El militar retirado indicó que el actual viceministro de Seguridad Ciudadana, Tarek El Aissami, quedará encargado del Ministerio de Relaciones Interiores.
Al ser preguntado sobre su nuevo destino, Rodríguez Chacín dijo que "un revolucionario no es revolucionario temporalmente, lo es siempre, y yo sigo a la orden y al servicio de este proceso. Voy ahora donde me mande la revolución".
Rodríguez Chacín ingresó por primera vez al gabinete de Chávez en el 2002 como ministro de Relaciones Interiores y semanas después del fallido golpe de abril de ese año el mandatario lo destituyó del cargo.
Durante los últimos años el oficial retirado se desempeñó como enlace del gobierno venezolano con los grupos guerrilleros colombianos.
Rodríguez Chacín fue uno de los promotores de un polémico decreto-ley de inteligencia y contrainteligencia que obligaba a la población a actuar como informantes de los cuerpos de seguridad. Chávez derogó la referida regulación, pocos días después de sancionarla, argumentando que violaba la constitución.
Ike arrasa en Cuba; avanza hacia el Occidente y deja 4 muertos
Al menos cuatro personas murieron en accidentes relacionados con el paso del huracán Ike por Cuba, donde el mar de leva y los ríos crecidos inundaron barrios mientras los vientos destrozaron techos en la zona oriental de la isla.
El huracán se encuentra ahora en dirección a La Habana y las provincias occidentales, que fueron devastadas por Gustav la semana pasada.
Mientras avanzaban los preparativos en la capital, las autoridades comenzaron el lunes a evaluar los daños causados por Ike en las provincias orientales, donde la tormenta tocó tierra el domingo con Categoría 3, lanzando olas de cinco pisos de alto contra los edificios junto al mar y dejando la mayor parte del país a oscuras.
El lunes en la noche la televisión estatal informó de cuatro víctimas fatales. Dos de las víctimas perecieron cuando desmontaban una antena en el techo de su vivienda en Corralillo, Villa Clara. La antena cayó sobre el tendido eléctrico y dos personas murieron electrocutadas, según el informe preliminar de la televisión.
Además, en Camagüey otro murió al caerle encima una pared de su vivienda, derrumbada por un árbol que se desplomó por los vientos huracanados. La cuarta víctima fue una anciana, aplastada por el desplome de su casa en el poblado de Banes, provincia de Holguín.
Tres ríos se desbordaron en Camagüey, 15 pies por encima de su nivel normal, lo que obligó a las autoridades a usar vehículos anfibios para evacuar no sólo a los vecinos sino a quienes habían huido de la costa. En Las Tunas, donde 18 personas resultaron lesionadas, los medios de comunicación estatales informaron que las pérdidas "no tenían precedentes''.
El gobierno declaró la alerta ciclónica en La Habana, la ya debilitada provincia de Pinar del Río y el municipio especial de Isla de la Juventud, y se suspendieron las labores de recuperación por Gustav en anticipación a la llegada de Ike este martes en la tarde.
En total, más de 1.2 millones de personas han sido evacuadas.
Este martes se espera que Ike se mueva hacia el Este a lo largo de la costa sur de Matanzas, cruce el Golfo de Batabanó y atraviese la isla con dirección noroeste entre Pinar del Río y la provincia de La Habana. Los meteorólogos pronostican que Ike volverá a tocar tierra con Categoría 1 y vientos de 80 millas por hora 50 millas al oeste de La Habana, la capital de país, con 2.1 millones de habitantes.
Un golpe en La Habana sería desastroso para Cuba, donde muchas personas viven hacinadas en edificios viejos y en mal estado, que a veces se derrumban con un simple aguacero.
"Esto ha sido enorme. Nunca hemos visto un huracán de esta intensidad'', afirmó Mabel Santana, de 60 años y del Central Delicias, un pueblo de 35,000 habitantes en la provincia Las Tunas. "El pueblo ha desaparecido. La mayoría de las casas eran de madera con techo de zinc, casi todas con más de 60 años. Mi casa se quedó sin techo. Así no puedo vivir. Esto es terrible, perder la casa, sabiendo que no puedes recuperarla''.
Santana está casada con el disidente encarcelado Alfredo Domínguez Batista, uno de los 75 opositores arrestados durante una ola represiva del 2003. Santana afirmó que su esposo no sabía de lo ocurrido a la casa ni el estado de sus dos hijos y un nieto de 6 años.
"Tendré que esperar hasta el miércoles a eso de la 1 p.m., cuando me dan 20 minutos para hablar con él por teléfono, para decirle que perdimos la casa'', amplió Santana. "Los árboles caídos obstaculizan las vías. No hay carreteras. No hay nada''.
En Santa Cruz del Sur, Camagüey, los medios estatales dijeron que el mar había penetrado casi media milla. Los vecindarios alrededor del río Jatibonico estaban inundados. El puerto industrial de Nuevitas sufrió serios daños, al igual que la ciudad Camagüey, informó el periódico Adelante.
"Las casas viejas no resistieron y se derrumbaron'', relató Manolo Banegas por teléfono desde Camagüey. "Muchos de los ríos se desbordaron e inundaron la ciudad. En los suburbios las calles están todavía más anegadas''.
También en el centro de Camagüey hubo informes de que el viento destrozó el techo de un teatro histórico construido en 1850. El centro cultural y un banco también sufrieron daños serios, así como las cúpulas de varios antiguos edificios.
"Sonaba como un gato adolorido'', relató Elena Martínez por teléfono desde Camagüey. Su esposo se subió al techo de la casa a primeras horas del lunes para revisar los daños y vio techos destrozados en varias manzanas a la redonda.
En Holguín, como en la mayoría de las provincias afectadas, los pobladores permanecían sin corriente eléctrica ni acceso a medios informativos nacionales, debido a la caída de las torres repetidoras en la región. Los poblados holguineros de Antilla, Banes, Rafael Freyre y Moa --todos costeros-- se hallaban totalmente incomunicados.
Radio Reloj reportó que en Guantánamo 10,000 casas fueron dañadas. Los informes iniciales indicaron que hubo daños "serios'' en Santiago de Cuba. En Guantánamo se perdieron 200,000 platas de plátano, según información del gobierno.
Idel Marrero, funcionario de la Defensa Civil de Río Cauto en Granma, declaró al periódico La Demajagua que las instalaciones azucareras y agrícolas sufrieron fuertes daños.
"En la planta 15 de diciembre, el mayor procesador de alimentos aquí, los plátanos estaban en el suelo'', dijo Marrero, agregando que las plantaciones de caña de azúcar también quedaron destruidas.
El jefe de la Defensa Civil en Camagüey dijo que Ike causó pérdidas devastadoras en los edificios del gobierno y viviendas en Nuevitas, en la costa norte, en Puerto de Tarafa y en los hoteles para turistas en la playa Santa Lucía.
El mar de leva y las inundaciones en las zonas costeras también afectaron el centro turístico en la playa Punta de Ganado.
Muchos árboles en el parque forestal Casino Campestre fueron derribados, según informes noticiosos de la isla. El Parque Las Leyendas quedó "prácticamente destruido''.
"Nunca he visto algo así en toda mi vida'', dijo Juan Carlos Figueira, de 40 años, en una entrevista telefónica desde Holguín. "Hay muchas casas parcialmente destruidas, árboles y líneas telefónicas en el suelo. No tenemos electricidad desde el domingo y no sabemos cuándo restablecerán el servicio porque los postes están en el suelo''.
Equipos de la defensa civil comenzaron a evaluar los daños el lunes y encontraron árboles y postes caídos, transformadores dañados, viviendas total o parcialmente derrumbadas, así como casas y escuelas sin techo, ventanas o puertas, y en algunos casos sin paredes.
En Baracoa, pocas millas al sureste de dónde Ike tocó tierra en Punta Lucrecia, siete personas resultados lesionadas, según información de Radio Habana.
"Sin sensacionalismo, puedo decir que los daños fueron serios'', dijo Luis A. Torres Iríbar, presidente del Consejo de la Defensa Civil de Guantánamo, en el programa de televisión Mesa Redonda. "Los daños en Baracoa fueron numerosos, especialmente las viviendas. Hay 1,086 viviendas dañadas, de las cuales 346 pueden considerarse pérdida total''.
Los deslaves bloquearon el acceso a las ciudades de Maisí y Moa, donde informes de radio indicaron que hubo daños graves.
Un corresponsal de Radio Rebelde en Holguín dijo que los postes de comunicaciones estaban en el suelo y que "comunicaciones por líneas telefónicas de tierra y móviles son imposibles''.
Sept. 9 (Bloomberg) -- Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac used accounting rules that created a ``house of cards'' as the housing market descended into its worst slump since the Great Depression.
While the two largest mortgage-finance companies met regulatory requirements for their capital, reviews by the Treasury, the Federal Housing Finance Agency and the Federal Reserve found they probably wouldn't weather the highest delinquency rates on record, lawmakers and regulators said.
``Once they got someone looking closely at Fannie and Freddie's books, they realized there just wasn't adequate capital there,'' U.S. Senator Richard Shelby of Alabama, the ranking Republican on the Senate Banking Committee, said after a briefing by Treasury officials. ``They found out they had a house of cards.''
Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and FHFA Director James Lockhart seized control of Fannie and Freddie less than a month after Lockhart, whose job is to oversee the companies, declared them ``adequately capitalized'' under law. The discrepancy highlights the flaws in legislation and in the regulatory oversight of Fannie and Freddie that didn't demand they keep more assets as a cushion against losses, according to Joshua Rosner, an analyst with Graham Fisher & Co. in New York.
``Fannie and Freddie's accounting during the housing crisis appears to have been more fantasy than reality,'' said Rosner, who first highlighted problems in 2003, before the two companies were forced to restate about $11.3 billion in earnings.
`Not Adequate'
Washington-based Fannie had $47 billion of regulatory capital as of June 30, about $9.5 billion above what FHFA required, according to company filings. McLean, Virginia-based Freddie's capital stood at $37.1 billion, a cushion of about $2.6 billion over FHFA's standard, filings show.
``They met the legal definition,'' Lockhart said in an interview with Bloomberg Television yesterday. ``As I have been telling lawmakers for a long time, that legal definition was not adequate.''
As their stock prices declined and yields on their debt rose to the highest in at least 10 years above benchmark rates, the FHFA saw ``big questions out there,'' Lockhart said.
``The issue is that the exposures are continuing and continuing to grow and it looked like in the future there were going to be significant issues and they were going to have capital problems,'' Lockhart said.
Lockhart said he brought in financial examiners for the Federal Reserve and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency to help with a review of the companies' finances. Treasury also sought help from Morgan Stanley officials, who prepared a report after trawling through the accounts.
`Too Low'
After looking through the finances, Fed examiners deemed their capital reserves too low, Dallas Fed President Richard Fisher said yesterday.
``We concluded that the capital of these institutions was too low relative to their exposure,'' Fisher said in response to an audience question after a speech in Austin, Texas. Further, ``that capital in and of itself was of low quality.''
Fannie counted $20.6 billion in so-called deferred tax credits toward its $47 billion of regulatory capital as of June 30, according to company disclosures. Freddie applied $18.4 billion in deferred-tax assets toward its $37.1 billion in regulatory capital in the second quarter.
Fannie and Freddie have posted four straight quarterly net losses totaling a combined $14.9 billion and have said they anticipate more. The tax credits don't have any value unless the companies are generating profit.
`Not Even Real'
``That's not even real money,'' Shelby said.
Senator Christopher Dodd, a Connecticut Democrat and chairman of the Senate Banking Committee responsible for oversight of the companies, said yesterday he plans to hold hearings on why the Bush administration didn't act sooner.
``Why weren't we doing more, why did we wait almost a year before there were any significant steps taken to try to deal with this problem?'' Dodd said in a Bloomberg Television interview. ``I have a lot of questions about where was the administration over the last eight years.''
Market Value
After more than eight years of debate, Congress passed a law in July expanding Lockhart's authority to raise capital requirements, curb growth and to take over the companies' operations in a conservatorship or liquidate their assets under receivership. The legislation also gave Paulson temporary power to inject unlimited sums of taxpayer money into the companies.
The companies just four years ago admitted to $11.3 billion in earnings misstatements that led to $525 million in federal fines, tighter regulatory controls and the ouster of the CEOs.
Paulson said he stepped in to prevent a collapse of the companies, protecting investors owning more than $5 trillion of Fannie and Freddie corporate debt and mortgage-backed securities while potentially sacrificing holders of the common and preferred stocks.
The companies yesterday lost the majority of their market value, with Fannie falling 90 percent to 73 cents in New York Stock Exchange composite trading, its lowest level since 1982. Freddie dropped 83 percent to 88 cents, the lowest since the regular common stock began trading 20 years ago.
The stocks rebounded in European trading today. Fannie rose 12 cents, or 16 percent, to 85 cents by 9:44 a.m. in Frankfurt, and Freddie gained 8 cents, or 9 percent, to 96 cents.
Sept. 9 (Bloomberg) -- John McCain and Barack Obama agree the Treasury needed to step in to rescue Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. They disagree over how much the U.S. government should be involved in the housing market once the immediate crisis is past.
Republican Senator McCain of Arizona wants the government to take over the two agencies, split them up, and then exit the mortgage-finance business by selling them off. Democratic Senator Obama of Illinois is suggesting a more lasting federal involvement.
``The role of the U.S. government in the housing industry is in play,'' said Jim Leach, a former 15-term Republican congressman from Iowa who is now an Obama supporter. ``There are pragmatic and philosophical issues at stake.''
The differences between the two presidential candidates over the lenders mirror a broader philosophical divide over the part the government should play in the economy. McCain supports steep cuts in taxes and spending to promote growth. Obama, while backing some tax reductions, favors increased public investment to boost the economy and job growth.
Conservatorship
Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Housing Finance Agency Director James Lockhart placed Fannie and Freddie in a government-operated conservatorship over the weekend, ousting their chief executives and eliminating their dividends.
McCain, 72, and Obama, 47, have both endorsed the Treasury rescue of the two firms as necessary given the fragile state of the housing market and economy. They were also sharply critical of the managements of the government-sponsored companies, which together own or guarantee almost half of U.S. home loans.
The candidates found less common ground on the mortgage giants' long-term fate, which Paulson, 62, said remained undetermined until at least after the November election.
``The new Congress and the next administration must decide what role government in general, and these entities in particular, should play in the housing market,'' he told reporters over the weekend.
Robert Litan, vice president for the Kansas City, Missouri- based Kauffman Foundation, said the next president faces three choices for dealing with Fannie and Freddie: retain the current public/private partnership in some form, nationalize the companies, or privatize them.
McCain Plan
McCain is clear on what he wants to do. He backs a solution put forward by former Federal Reserve Chairman and fellow Republican Alan Greenspan that would break the companies up and sell the pieces off.
McCain would ``get them completely off the taxpayers' back,'' Douglas Holtz-Eakin, McCain's chief economic adviser, said in an interview on Bloomberg Television yesterday.
He added though that the Republican nominee saw some role for government in ``making credit available to those who otherwise can't get a mortgage'' through the Federal Housing Administration and other agencies.
Obama has been more circumspect on what should be done once the crisis is over, while making clear that a return to the status quo that existed before the rescue is unacceptable.
``We must ensure that any plan clarifies the true public and private status of our housing policies,'' the Democrat said over the weekend. ``We have to make clear that in our market system investors can't be allowed to believe that, unlike working families, they can simply invest in a `heads they win, tails they don't lose' situation.''
`Hasty' and `Ideological'
Jason Furman, Obama's top economic adviser, attacked McCain's privatization plan as ``hasty'' and ``ideological.''
``These institutions do serve a lot of vital public functions for affordable housing that just aren't served right now by any other government institutions,'' he told Bloomberg Television in a separate interview yesterday.
Furman said the outcome would depend on ``disentangling'' the important roles that Fannie and Freddie perform that can't be replicated by the private sector from those functions that can be handled by the market.
``Both candidates agree that the current model doesn't work,'' said Daniel Clifton, head of policy research in Washington for Strategas Research Partners. ``They have different solutions based on their ideological bent.''
Democratic Congress
In any case, whoever wins the presidential race will have to get a plan through a Democratic-controlled Congress that has strongly supported Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
``You can't eliminate them,'' Connecticut lawmaker Chris Dodd, the chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, told Bloomberg Television yesterday. ``They have been a tremendous source of stability and strength'' for the housing market.
His counterpart in the House, Massachusetts Representative Barney Frank, who heads the Financial Services Committee, lauded Fannie and Freddie's ``vital role'' in a statement issued Sept. 6.
Charles Calomiris, chairman of Reston, Virginia-based Greater Financial Corp. and a long-time critic of the two firms, told Bloomberg Radio that Congress had persistently opposed overhauling the companies.
``McCain would be inclined toward a more radical solution, though Obama might have a better chance at a less radical solution,'' said Gerald O'Driscoll, a former vice president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas and now a scholar at the Cato Institute in Washington. ``But both of them face a Democratic Congress that is very wedded to these two firms as they exist.''
Generals Behaving Badly
When Abraham Lincoln famously sent word to Gen. George McClellan that he'd like to "borrow" the army if the general wasn't planning on using it, the commander of Union forces likely did not take it kindly. McClellan, after all, was a man whose letters home referred to Lincoln as an "idiot," "a well-meaning baboon" and other colorful language.
![[Main Street]](http://s.wsj.net/public/resources/images/ED-AI194_mcgurn_D_20080908154626.jpg) |
| AP |
| Gen. George Casey. |
In the first few pages of "The War Within," Bob Woodward opens with another presidential remark that offended another wartime general. This time the recipient was the commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, Gen. George Casey. During a videoconference with Baghdad, the president said, "George, we're not playing for a tie. I want to make sure we all understand this." Gen. Casey, Mr. Woodward writes, took this as "an affront to his dignity that he would long remember."
Whether or not Gen. Casey long remembered, "The War Within" makes clear his disdain for his commander in chief. If the views and remarks attributed to Gen. Casey are not accurate, Mr. Woodward has done him a grave injustice. If they are accurate, they come as further evidence of the obstacles President George W. Bush had to overcome to get his commanders to start winning in Iraq.
Opening with Gen. Casey also says something about Mr. Woodward. There's a case, I suppose, for using the general who opposed the surge to open what is hailed as the definitive account of that surge (not to mention using Robert McNamara, the Defense secretary who helped lose Vietnam to end the book). Surely, however, that would be the same case for wrapping the definitive account of the strategy that brought Robert E. Lee to Appomattox around Gen. McClellan.
Gen. Casey, after all, was the commander who all along maintained that the solution in Iraq was for America to draw down its forces -- even after the bombing of the Golden Mosque in Samarra. He was the commander who later that year was given his own chance to secure Baghdad with Operations Together Forward I and II, and failed. Most of all, he is the commander who was wrong when the president was right to insist that Baghdad could be secured and al Qaeda dealt a harsh blow with more troops.
Gen. Casey's continued adherence to a failed strategy does not make him a dishonorable man. It does make him an odd choice to serve as the foundation for the charge that the president was out of touch with the war. As evidence, both the general and the journalist point to questions about how many of the enemy we were killing as a sign that "the president did not get it."
Then again, maybe it's Gen. Casey and Mr. Woodward who did not get it. The questions the president asked were driven by something everyone in the West Wing worried about. Every night for years, Americans tuning into the evening news were greeted by the same image from Iraq: a burning car or Humvee, accompanied by a fresh report about soldiers or Marines who'd been blown up by an improvised explosive device or suicide bomb.
Nor did these images exist in a vacuum. A media obsessed with body counts featured grim roll calls of the dead, marking each macabre "milestone" -- 1,500 war dead, 2,000 war dead -- along the way. In this context, was it really unreasonable for a president to ask his commander on the ground if we were fighting back, when it sure didn't look that way to the American people?
The same might be said of the one truly original take offered by Mr. Woodward. This is his curious assertion that it's not the surge that has produced the great reduction in violence in Iraq. The reduced violence, he says, is the result of the increased lethality of covert operations against terrorist leaders and operatives.
Which brings up two interesting points. First, we are led to find fault with a president allegedly obsessed with a "kill the bastards" approach to Iraq. But then we are asked to accept that the reason we're now seeing success in Iraq because we're . . . killing the bastards.
Second, the surge was a shift in mission, not simply an addition of five brigades. Until the surge, we had pursued a political solution, hoping that the answer to Iraq was the rise of a democratic government that would persuade Iraqis to come together for their future. The surge, by contrast, finally recognized the obvious: Until Iraqis started feeling safe in their own homes and neighborhoods, there would be no compromise or rebuilding.
Sophisticates have never liked Mr. Bush for his preference for words like "win" and "victory" to describe what America is trying to do in Iraq. And if Mr. Woodward's latest contribution is any clue, they'll never forgive him for doing something even worse: proving it can be done.
ObamaTax 3.0
The good news is that Barack Obama said on ABC Sunday that he might not go through with his plans to increase taxes.
The bad news is that the economy has to be mired in recession to avoid the largest tax increase in the nation's history.
![[Barack Obama]](http://s.wsj.net/public/resources/images/HC-GL956_Obama_20080508114852.gif)
Our check of the Dow Jones Factiva database suggests that other than viewers of ABC's "This Week," only three or four newspapers carried an account of Senator Obama's amended tax plan. While it's possible that the story of a deferred tax increase could shock the media into paralysis, we take it as an encouraging sign. The education of Barack Obama continues apace.
For the record, here is what he told ABC's George Stephanopoulos.
Mr. Stephanopoulos: "So even if we're in a recession next January, you come into office, you'll still go through with your tax increases?"
Senator Obama: "No, no, no, no, no. What I've said, George, is that even if we're still in a recession, I'm going to go through with my tax cuts. That's my priority."
Mr. Stephanopoulos: "But not the increases?"
Senator Obama: "I think we've got to take a look and see where the economy is. The economy is weak right now. The news with Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, I think, along with the unemployment numbers indicates that we're fragile. I want to accelerate those tax cuts through a second stimulus package, get more money into the pockets of ordinary Americans, see if we can stabilize the housing market, and then we're going to have to reevaluate at the beginning of the year to see what kind of hole we're in."
* * *
Even individuals staring down the barrel of Mr. Obama's tax increases should not wish for an economic recession to give them a reprieve. The relevant point is that it was early last year, when the "Bush economy" was still humming, that Senator Obama first proposed pushing taxes sharply upward on "the wealthy," while giving what he calls "tax cuts" (actually they are credits, not rate reductions) to "the middle class."
At the time, Mr. Obama was the long shot in the Democratic Presidential sweepstakes, and it made some political sense to reassure the party's intensely liberal primary voters with class-war boilerplate on taxes.
Under ObamaTax 1.0, he would have repealed all the Bush tax cuts, lifted the cap on wages subject to the payroll tax, put the top marginal rate up to 39.8% and raised the rate on capital gains and dividends to at least 25% from 15% now. The official campaign line was that tax rates really don't matter to economic growth.
Summer arrived, the Clinton challenge was history and with the general election ahead came ObamaTax 2.0. It posited that the top rate on capital gains now would be 20%, described on this page August 14 by economic advisers Jason Furman and Austan Goolsbee as "almost a third lower than the rate President Reagan set in 1986." This was progress.
Now with the big vote less than 60 days off and John McCain pounding him as a tax-raiser and pulling ahead in some polls, the Democratic nominee has decided to release ObamaTax 3.0, the most interesting upgrade so far. If the economy is still weak in January, a President Obama might defer all of the planned increases.
Several interpretations of this shift are possible, none of which reflect badly on Senator Obama's political learning curve.
At the bloodless level of simply wishing to win, the Obama camp may have concluded that in the sprint to November it is a losing strategy to be the election's only doctrinaire tax raiser. A tight race tends to focus political minds, and none forget Walter Mondale's catastrophic promise in his 1984 acceptance speech: "Mr. Reagan will raise taxes, and so will I. He won't tell you. I just did."
Beyond this lies the economic reality of jacking up income, investment and payroll taxes on "the wealthy" amid a flat or falling economy. In the standard narrative, these taxpayers exist as fat cats atop hedge funds, banks and megacorporations. Let's toss into the vat the top-tier managers of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the Beltway's own fat-cat sinecure.
The reality is that the creators of new jobs in the economy are more likely to be rising entrepreneurs or filers under Subchapter S, who typically pay taxes at individual rates. Hanging three or four tax millstones around their productive necks in January if the economy is weak will likely produce unimpressive growth and job numbers in the first year of the new Obama Presidency, and likely beyond. That in turn could drag down the Democrats in Congress who will get credit for voting these higher taxes into law.
Thus Mr. Obama's unambiguous answer Sunday to whether he'd insist on his tax increases if the economy is in an official recession: "No, no, no, no, no." It seems Mr. McCain is right that taxes do matter.
Mr. Obama's most ardent primary supporters may not like it, but we'll take the five "Nos" as evidence that Senator Obama may be learning the difference between liberal doctrine and sensible governance.
The GOP Should Kiss
Gay-Bashing Goodbye
Political conventions are memorable not only for what the party grandees say, but for what they leave out. What was noticeably absent from last week's Republican gabfest? Gay-bashing.
This is not an insignificant development for Republicans. In 2004, gays featured prominently at the Republicans' convention and in their rhetoric. In February of that year, President George W. Bush announced his support for the Federal Marriage Amendment (FMA), which would have written discrimination into our country's founding document by stipulating that marriage can only occur between a man and a woman.
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| AP |
| Patrick Sammon, president of the Log Cabin Republicans. |
"Because the union of a man and woman deserves an honored place in our society, I support the protection of marriage against activist judges," Mr. Bush declared from the podium at Madison Square Garden.
It would be unfair to ascribe bigoted impulses to everyone who supports such an amendment. After all, gay marriage is an unfamiliar concept and people are naturally resistant to change. But the rhetoric of those supporting the FMA often went above and beyond expressing concern for the state of a weakening social institution and depicted gays as a nefarious force from whose conjugations America had to be protected. Gays became the target of a divisive campaign aimed at stirring up the GOP's socially conservative base.
As disappointing as the GOP's 2004 campaign was in this regard, it didn't hold a candle to the party's 1992 convention. The most famous speech to occur in Houston that year was the prime-time address delivered by Patrick Buchanan on opening night. "Pitchfork Pat" had challenged George H.W. Bush for the Republican nomination and did surprisingly well for a candidate confronting a sitting president. His address that year is best remembered for his observation that "there is a religious war going on in our country for the soul of America . . . a cultural war, as critical to the kind of nation we will one day be as was the Cold War itself."
Mr. Buchanan made it clear that primary soldiers on the other, dark side of this "cultural war" were gay people. Telling the audience that while the "three million Americans who voted for me" disagreed with Mr. Bush on some issues, he declared that "we stand with him against the amoral idea that gay and lesbian couples should have the same standing in law as married men and women."
And while rightly criticizing the Democrats for barring the antiabortion Democratic governor of Pennsylvania Bill Casey from speaking at their convention that year, Mr. Buchanan went on to rail that "a militant leader of the homosexual rights movement could rise at that convention and exult: 'Bill Clinton and Al Gore represent the most pro-lesbian and pro-gay ticket in history.' And so they do."
Other speakers, most prominently Vice President Dan Quayle, joined Mr. Buchanan in denigrating gay people. "Americans try to raise their children to understand right and wrong -- only to be told that every so-called lifestyle alternative is morally equivalent. That is wrong," he told the assembled delegates.
The image that Republicans projected to voters was that of a fearful party looking bitterly toward the past. This was hardly an advertisement for the cheerful, optimistic conservatism of Ronald Reagan, whose convention speech -- his last major address to the nation -- was overshadowed by the divisive rhetoric coming from the likes of Messrs. Buchanan and Quayle.
So it was refreshing to see that gays were not part of the agenda this year. Indeed, the only speaker to make mention of them was the former Arkansas governor and Baptist preacher Mike Huckabee, and he did so only tangentially, stating that Mr. McCain "doesn't want to change the very definition of marriage from what it has always meant throughout recorded human history." (The same, of course, could be said of the supposedly gay-friendly Barack Obama, who also opposes marriage equality for gay couples).
The absence of antigay rhetoric has much to do with Mr. McCain; he is comfortable around gay people, and his old-fashioned sense of honor proscribes against making them pariahs for political gain. He also has a better record on gay issues than most of his Republican colleagues, having courageously stood up against his party by opposing the FMA.
Partly for that stand, he won the endorsement last week of the Log Cabin Republicans, a gay GOP group that declined to endorse Mr. Bush in 2004 over his demagoguing gay marriage. Steve Schmidt, Mr. McCain's senior strategist, spoke to Log Cabin on the last day of the convention, informing them that "my sister and her partner are an important part of my life and our children's life," and that "I admire your group and your organization and I encourage you to keep fighting for what you believe in because the day is going to come."
Republicans might also have noticed the opinions of their own party members and realized that attacking the "gay agenda" would prove unpopular. On the eve of the convention, a New York Times/CBS News poll reported 49% of Republican delegates were in support of either civil unions (43%) or marriage (6%) for gay couples. While 90% of Democratic delegates support either marriage (55%) or civil unions (35%), Republican delegates -- the party's conservative base -- are actually more liberal on this issue than Republican voters, only 39% of whom support either option. With 58% of the American public in favor of some form of legal recognition, Republicans are actually closer to the national mood, and are hopefully beginning to understand that Buchananite "cultural war" rhetoric is fast becoming a thing of the past.
To be sure, the GOP still stands on the wrong side of history. Its platform backs the FMA, and goes so far as to declare that, "homosexuality is incompatible with military service" (not merely open homosexuality -- which is barred by the Clinton-era "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" regulation -- but homosexuality itself). At a time when our country faces such perilous threats from abroad, attacking gay people who wish to serve their country in the armed forces is not just cruel. It weakens our national security. And while the Democrats running Congress have yet to move forward on the promises they've made to gay voters, the party is far more welcoming to gays than the GOP. Mr. Obama did refer to "our gay and lesbian brothers and sisters" in his acceptance speech.
As Mr. McCain made clear last week, the last eight years of Republican rule in Washington have forced many people to question whether his party actually stands for its self-declared principles of individual liberty and smaller government. In this regard, he criticized his party for succumbing to the "temptations of corruption" and wasteful spending. But he also could have gone after their cynical stigmatization of an entire class of citizens. That Mr. McCain declined to go after his party on this matter is unfortunate, if understandable, given the grief he's caused them on so many other fronts. It may sound like cold comfort, but gay people have something to appreciate in the fact that, this year, Republicans left them alone.
Mr. Kirchick is an assistant editor of The New Republic.
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