Mark Winston Griffith

Preach, Brother, Preach! Obama tells it like it is on Subprime Lending

I'm one of those people who has remained agnostic on the Obama presidential candidacy. While he oozes genuine humanity and is an iconoclastic figure in presidential politics, some of his policy positions have been, well, safe. He looks like a 2008 bio-diesel sipping De Lorean, but drives like a pre-owned Volvo station wagon.

That's why I'm particularly tickled by Obama's stance on the subprime crises. The Financial Times recently reported that "Mr Obama blamed lobbyists working on behalf of lenders for obstructing tougher regulation of the subprime industry, adding: 'Our government failed to provide the regulatory scrutiny that could have prevented this crisis.'

"...Mr Obama said the government needed to ‘stop the unlicensed, unregulated, fly-by-night mortgage brokers who are hoodwinking low- income borrowers into loans they can'' afford.'

"He added that ‘Washington needs to stop acting like an industry advocate and start acting like a public advocate.'"

Now that’s the truth telling, ass kickin’, attitude that I’ve been longing to hear from his smoker’s lips.

Clearly, this won't endear him to the undercover Wall Street Journal types who are pumping fat dollars into his campaign coffers, but if Obama keeps talking like this on other issues he might just accomplish something even more magical - like win himself a vote. Mine, to be exact.

Posted at 7:25 AM, Aug 31, 2007 in Economy | Permalink | Comments (0)