You Know, It's A Very Curious World

As a follow-up to the video to which I linked on Saturday (and again this morning) in which part of the blame for the current economic crisis is placed on the CRA, or Community Reinvestment Act, signed into law in 1977 by President Jimmy Carter, I offer you this rebuttal from Business Week. But this is a curious world, perhaps even an Orwellian world. For over at Wikipedia, something a lot like a 1984 debate has broken out over the CRA; claims of revising history are being hurled about.

As you know, Wikipedia entries are generally created in a cooperative, peer-reviewed fashion. Wikipedia (perhaps even the whole of the World Wide Web) at times feels a bit like Orwell's Ministry of Truth, where real truths are tossed into the fires of forgetfulness. Just one look at the Wiki debate or "talk" page on the CRA entry (the entry is now under dispute) and a person could begin to worry that perhaps the truly historical and historically true are no longer secure. Some Wiki contributors even assert, rather casually, that sources submitted to the debate are subject to vandalism. Oiks!

Please note that the conversation is rather hard to follow. But there are some interesting observations and contentions offered.

Here's something from the Business Week article to which I linked at the top of this post:

University of Michigan law professor Michael Barr testified back in February before the House Committee on Financial Services that 50% of subprime loans were made by mortgage service companies not subject [sic] comprehensive federal supervision and another 30% were made by affiliates of banks or thrifts which are not subject to routine supervision or examinations. As former Fed Governor Ned Gramlich said in an August, 2007, speech shortly before he passed away: “In the subprime market where we badly need supervision, a majority of loans are made with very little supervision. It is like a city with a murder law, but no cops on the beat.”

But on the Wiki talk page I found this simple but rather astute observation submitted in an unsigned contribution:

But what Michael Barr says is:

"More than half of subprime loans were made by independent mortgage companies not subject to comprehensive federal supervision"

it doesn't say they weren't subject to the CRA.

Indeed, it seems someone has at least got one thing right.

Peace.

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