Interesting
Mom was in town last weekend. During some of our time in the car Mom told me the current housing crisis was Clinton's fault. Apparently Clinton was the one who introduced the idea that people who couldn't afford homes should be able to own one anyway.
What is more interesting to me than blaming someone eight years removed from the problem is the assumption that it's the irresponsible poor who are losing their homes in this foreclosure mess we're in right now.
I sorta vaguely remember something about Clinton saying something about everyone deserving the chance to own a home and improve their lot in life. I am totally talking off the cuff here, so feel free to fact check and correct me, but my guess is that Clinton meant everyone deserved the chance to own a home, not everyone deserved a chance to own a bigger home. Again, no numbers to back this up, but my guess is at least equal numbers of people are losing their $300,000+ McMansions as are the working poor losing their homes in the current crisis.
Frankly I think more upper middle class folk are losing their homes than not. In fact, I'd be willing to bet the working poor haven't had much easier access to home loans than they have had before. A loan on a $75K fixer-upper in a run-down neighborhood to a guy working two dead-end jobs is a bad bet no matter what the state of the economy. It's the expensive property in "nice" neighborhoods that people were speculating on.
I can guarantee you it wasn't the working poor who created this housing mess. So who is it really who is irresponsible with money? And which is worse: being irresponsible with your own money or being irresponsible with someone else's money?