Acorn Responds!
Oct. 13th, 2008 02:36 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
webfarmerAs some of you know, various right-wing groups are trying to pin this economic disaster on a group that has helped to organize the poor. It's called ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now). Here's their response:
ACORN Response to Senator McCain's Smear Ad - Acorn.org
"ACORN President Maude Hurd released the following statement today in response to the McCain campaign's new ad claiming that, among other things, ACORN is responsible for the mortgage crisis:
'For almost a decade, ACORN, a community organization of 400,000 families in neighborhoods across the country, has been fighting against the predatory lending practices that have robbed our members of their homes, destabilized neighborhoods, and roiled the global economy.
'In his newest ad, John McCain's campaign bizarrely claims, 'ACORN forced banks to issue risky home loans, the same types of loans that caused the financial crisis we're in today.' Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, ACORN has worked successfully to help working class families get good home loans on fair terms from legitimate banks and has fought vigorously against predatory lenders who have ripped off families in our communities. These predatory loans caused the crisis.
'For more than a decade, ACORN members have held protests, released reports, and advocated for regulations to protect homeowners from predatory lenders. ACORN organizers and volunteers have been working day and night to help victims of the GOP economic meltdown to save their homes from foreclosure. In fact, ACORN has brought class action lawsuits against several predatory lenders, and has lobbied the Federal Reserve and Congress in support of regulations against predatory lending. ACORN has even been successful in convincing many lenders to treat homeowners more fairly and help families be able to make their mortgage payments and save their homes.
'Unfortunately, the Bush administration and Congressional Republicans like John McCain have blocked the sensible regulations that ACORN and others proposed that would have averted the mortgage meltdown. If John McCain thinks that community organizers caused the foreclosure crisis, he knows even less about the economy than previously thought.
'John McCain and the Republicans are desperately trying to shift the blame for the economic crisis they caused with a philosophy of deregulation and indifference to homeowners. All the grainy footage and creepy music in the world can't cancel out some simple, basic facts, and the facts about the economy are not on John McCain's side.'"
Columnist Clarence Page took on this ACORN myth as well:
A Lame Rap Aimed at Poor Folks by Clarence Page - Chicago Tribune - 08 Oct 08
"In a desperate attempt to deflect blame from deregulation and other policy ideas they favor, conservatives are pointing their guns at a 1977 law that hardly anyone outside housing and banking circles cared about.
It's called the Community Reinvestment Act. It requires banks that receive federal insurance to lend within their geographic communities.
Before laws such as the CRA came along, banks "redlined" entire neighborhoods, denying prospective home buyers, most of them minorities, conventional home loans. Thanks to the CRA, thousands of renters have become homeowners. Neighborhoods have been saved. Tax revenue has increased. Urban life has improved."
"Nice try, but the CRA's (Community Reinvestment Act's) villainy has been wildly exaggerated.
First, the CRA applies only to banks and thrifts that get federal insurance. It does not even apply to three-fourths of the institutions that made subprime loans, the high-interest loans at the heart of Wall Street's credit collapse.
Also, nothing in the CRA requires banks to offer subprime loans, interest-only loans, no-money-down loans or any of the other gimmicks that inflated the now-fizzling housing bubble. Quite the opposite, the law calls on lenders to meet the credit needs of the communities in which they are chartered, "consistent with the safe and sound operation" of those lenders.
Contrary to the myths, studies show that most CRA borrowers pay their bills on time and become successful homeowners. That's why the law has worked well for three decades, long before the recent Wall Street mess."
ACORN Response to Senator McCain's Smear Ad - Acorn.org
"ACORN President Maude Hurd released the following statement today in response to the McCain campaign's new ad claiming that, among other things, ACORN is responsible for the mortgage crisis:
'For almost a decade, ACORN, a community organization of 400,000 families in neighborhoods across the country, has been fighting against the predatory lending practices that have robbed our members of their homes, destabilized neighborhoods, and roiled the global economy.
'In his newest ad, John McCain's campaign bizarrely claims, 'ACORN forced banks to issue risky home loans, the same types of loans that caused the financial crisis we're in today.' Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, ACORN has worked successfully to help working class families get good home loans on fair terms from legitimate banks and has fought vigorously against predatory lenders who have ripped off families in our communities. These predatory loans caused the crisis.
'For more than a decade, ACORN members have held protests, released reports, and advocated for regulations to protect homeowners from predatory lenders. ACORN organizers and volunteers have been working day and night to help victims of the GOP economic meltdown to save their homes from foreclosure. In fact, ACORN has brought class action lawsuits against several predatory lenders, and has lobbied the Federal Reserve and Congress in support of regulations against predatory lending. ACORN has even been successful in convincing many lenders to treat homeowners more fairly and help families be able to make their mortgage payments and save their homes.
'Unfortunately, the Bush administration and Congressional Republicans like John McCain have blocked the sensible regulations that ACORN and others proposed that would have averted the mortgage meltdown. If John McCain thinks that community organizers caused the foreclosure crisis, he knows even less about the economy than previously thought.
'John McCain and the Republicans are desperately trying to shift the blame for the economic crisis they caused with a philosophy of deregulation and indifference to homeowners. All the grainy footage and creepy music in the world can't cancel out some simple, basic facts, and the facts about the economy are not on John McCain's side.'"
Columnist Clarence Page took on this ACORN myth as well:
A Lame Rap Aimed at Poor Folks by Clarence Page - Chicago Tribune - 08 Oct 08
"In a desperate attempt to deflect blame from deregulation and other policy ideas they favor, conservatives are pointing their guns at a 1977 law that hardly anyone outside housing and banking circles cared about.
It's called the Community Reinvestment Act. It requires banks that receive federal insurance to lend within their geographic communities.
Before laws such as the CRA came along, banks "redlined" entire neighborhoods, denying prospective home buyers, most of them minorities, conventional home loans. Thanks to the CRA, thousands of renters have become homeowners. Neighborhoods have been saved. Tax revenue has increased. Urban life has improved."
"Nice try, but the CRA's (Community Reinvestment Act's) villainy has been wildly exaggerated.
First, the CRA applies only to banks and thrifts that get federal insurance. It does not even apply to three-fourths of the institutions that made subprime loans, the high-interest loans at the heart of Wall Street's credit collapse.
Also, nothing in the CRA requires banks to offer subprime loans, interest-only loans, no-money-down loans or any of the other gimmicks that inflated the now-fizzling housing bubble. Quite the opposite, the law calls on lenders to meet the credit needs of the communities in which they are chartered, "consistent with the safe and sound operation" of those lenders.
Contrary to the myths, studies show that most CRA borrowers pay their bills on time and become successful homeowners. That's why the law has worked well for three decades, long before the recent Wall Street mess."
