Franks on words make him out to be a joke.

"These two entities—Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac—are not facing any kind of financial crisis," said Representative Barney Frank of Massachusetts, the ranking Democrat on the Financial Services Committee. "The more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing."

In the Washington Examiner, Tim Carney has a priceless column entitled “IndyMac forgot to pay protection money.” Liberal Senator Charles Schumer triggered a massive bank failure at IndyMac by scaring depositors into making a run on the bank. Ironically, Schumer and his political allies, Congressman Barney Frank and Senator Chris Dodd, have whitewashed financial problems at another shaky financial institution that poses a much bigger danger to our economy, the fraud-ridden government-backed mortgage giant Fannie Mae. The federal government is now planning to bail out Fannie Mae at a cost of billions of dollars. Why was IndyMac’s treatment so different from Fannie Mae’s? Carney explains that Fannie Mae has been run by a succession of liberal power-brokers, and its PAC has given lots of money to lawmakers to block any reform of its risky practices. Liberal lawmakers like Schumer, Dodd, and Frank opposed any reform of Fannie Mae, and helped spawn the mortgage crisis by pressuring lenders into making risky loans in the name of “diversity” and “affordable housing.”