Speaking in Arizona today about the details of his mortgage assistance plan, the President let loose one of the most amazing strings of woppers you'll ever hear. Speaking of the housing burst, he said:

It begins with a young family maybe in Mesa or Glendale or Tempe, or just as likely in a suburban area of Las Vegas or Cleveland or Miami. They save up. They search. They choose a home that feels like the perfect place to start a life. They secure a fixed-rate mortgage at a reasonable rate and they make a downpayment, and they make their mortgage payments each month. They are as responsible as anyone could ask them to be.

WAIT just a second. I feel like I'm living in bizarro world because that description has nothing to do with this particular housing crisis.

They saved? They made a down payment? They acted responsibly? In far too many cases we knoow that none of these statements was true.

Banks have been blamed, as have mortgage lenders, and rightly so. But borrowers get a pass--they were all just innocent dupes, apparently!

And we already know government has yet to be blamed, despite the fact that the Fed and the politics of affordable housing were the primary drivers of this whole mess. Listen here for a discussion as to why [1].

And let's not forget the dear Chairman of the Financial Services Committee, Barney Frank, and his ongoing fight against any serious regulation of the GSEs:

This video has a partisan slant, but Republicans don't deserve any credit because, ultimately, they didn't get anything done on reforming Fannie and Freddie, either. Still, the big drivers behind a constant defining down of lending standards are now in charge.

With these inmates truly running the asylum, what are the chances they'll get a "solution" right? Fat chance.

h/t to Mike Kerr at RedCounty [2] on the vid