Reforming Fannie and Freddie: No Escape for Taxpayers - Daniel Indiviglio - ... One proposal comes from Georgetown Professors Donald B. Marron and Phillip L. Swagel via a piece at economics21.org. The idea is interesting, as it intends to create a way for the government to promote home ownership without taxpayers paying the price. Unfortunately, that's not possible. ... Problem #2: The Government Must Misprice the Risk - But let's take this a step further. The government would have to intentionally charge insufficient fees: it must put too low a price on the risk for its presence in the mortgage market to serve any purpose ... - The Atlantic

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32 States Have Borrowed from the Federal Government to Make Unemployment Payments; California Has Borrowed $7 Billion - EconomicPolicyJournal.com has learned that 32 states have run out funds to make unemployment benefit payments and that the federal government has been supplying these states with funds so that they can make their  payments to the unemployed. 

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2 Barney videos in 2005 and 2010 - AND WE WONDER WHY THE ECONOMY IS SUCH A MESS…. -  Nice work on Friday by CNBC who called out Barney Frank for being a liar and a fraud. - The Pragmatic Capitalist

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Perspective on the Senate Financial Reform Bill - by Kevin LaCroix - ... The Senate Bill must now be reconciled with the financial reform legislation the House passed last December ... The massive Senate bill weighs in a 1566 pages - lots of details - D&O Diary

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The gathering revolt against government spending - By: MICHAEL BARONE - This month three members of Congress have been beaten in their bids for re-election -- a Republican senator from Utah, a Democratic congressman from West Virginia and a Republican-turned-Democrat senator from Pennsylvania. Their records and their curricula vitae are different. But they all have one thing in common: They are members of an Appropriations Committee - Washington Examiner 

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House Democrats Target Senator Lincoln’s Swaps-Desk Proposal - A group of U.S. House Democrats is strategizing to strip the most contentious derivatives language from legislation to overhaul the financial-regulatory system.  Representative Michael McMahon, a New York Democrat who played a role in shaping the House derivatives language passed last year, said he will work to remove a provision in the Senate legislation that would force commercial banks such as Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and JPMorgan Chase & Co. to move their swaps- trading operations to subsidiaries. - Bloomberg BusinessWeek

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One in 10 mortgage holders missed a payment this year - Sacramento Business Journal

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Wall Street critic Frank to shepherd final reform bill - U.S. representative Barney Frank, a fierce critic of Wall Street and close ally of the Obama administration, will head a House-Senate committee to hammer out a final bill on financial regulation reform. - Reuters
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Obama And Geithner Have A 'Man-Crush' On Each Other: New York Magazine - Huffington Post

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Rep. Frank indicates derivatives measure might be removed - Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., said a measure in the Senate's version of regulatory-reform legislation that would require banks to spin off their swaps-trading desks "goes too far." Frank, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, has a key role in reconciling the House and Senate versions of the legislation. Bankers and regulators oppose the derivatives measure, offered by Sen. Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark. The Wall Street Journal – Business 

White House Signals It Won't Fight to Keep Rule on Derivatives - By DAMIAN PALETTA - A senior Treasury Department official on Wednesday said a controversial provision that could force banks to spin off their derivatives portfolio was not part of the "core" changes White House officials wanted in the financial overhaul, offering the second signal in two days that the provision could be stripped out. - WSJ Business

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Obama Wants Global: Regulators Push for Global Rule on Bank Capital - ... Now one of the most consequential decisions about new restraints on the banking industry — how much more capital banks should hold in their rainy day reserves — is being decided not on Capitol Hill but far from Washington, by a committee based in Basel, Switzerland, The New York Times’s Binyamin Appelbaum reports.  The Obama administration is pursuing an international agreement to make banks hold significantly larger reserves, which it regards as essential to increase the stability of the global financial system. - NYT Dealbook

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Moody’s Reiterates U.S. Spending Risks Credit Rating - By Mary Childs - The U.S. government’s Aaa bond rating will come under pressure in the future unless additional measures are taken to reduce projected record budget deficits, according to Moody’s Investors Service Inc - Bloomberg

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On the Edge? - by Bruce Krasting -  Timmy G. is in Europe urging the financial leaders to, “ Do it Big and do it Fast!”. I think this was typical Dumb Tim. He is setting this up to come to a boiling point ASAP. That is the worst possible outcome. There are no short-term solutions to Europe’s problems. The EU has to buy itself some time to try to make adjustments. We need some cooler heads in charge. Instead "Cowboy Tim" starts shooting off a six-gun. As with most gunplay someone is going to get hurt. - Zero Hedge

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CRA At The Crossroads - BY VINCENT REINHART - ...Redlining, ... The Community Reinvestment Act (CRA), passed in 1977, was, on balance, a successful legislative response to that societal failure. ... The success was incomplete and came with significant costs. Moreover, those costs have increased over time as the structure of markets has evolved. Congress recognized it was aiming at a moving target in revisions to CRA in 1989, 1995, and 2005. ... it is appropriate to reconsider how best to achieve the mission of CRA.  To do so properly requires examining four widely recognized problems with CRA ... - MortgageOrb 
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Nothing To See Here! Wall Street Reform Negotiators Say No To Full Transparency - Brian Beutler - ... "No, you won't have time to do that, because...we have a fairly short time period," Frank told me this morning.  Whether time was the issue or not, other leading congressional negotiators didn't appear to have much of an appetite for operating in as open an environment as possible ... - Talking Points Memo

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Death Wish: Barney Frank Deals Fatal Blow to Wall Street Derivatives Ban - Alain Sherter - Bnet.com

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Detroit to bulldoze thousands of homes in fight for survival - By Alex Spillius -  Tired of Detroit's status as the symbol of everything wrong with urban America, its new mayor has come up with a radical solution: to bulldoze the city. - Telegraph.co.uk

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Antioch California Considers Bankruptcy; Former LA Mayor Predicts Bankruptcy for LA - (Miami also mentioned) - Michael Shedlock - MISH'S Global Economic Trend Analysis