The Washington Post devoted a full page article to the plight of the small clique of highly paid executives and managers at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac who could see their bonuses clipped as a result of the bill passed by Congress yesterday. At one point the article implies that the government's takeover of the mortgage giants destroyed the value of the stock held by these people: "Many employees lost small fortunes -- in some cases life savings -- when the government seized the firms and wiped out almost all their shares."
In fact, the shares were almost worthless at the point where the government stepped in. They had lost most of their value because the executives who ran Fannie and Freddie made really bad loans with the institutions money. The government stepped in to avert bankruptcy which would have wiped out the shareholders. So, it is not true that the government's action cost these people their life savings, bad management by Fannie and Freddie cost these people their life saving.
It is also worth remembering that the Washington Post is a newspaper that is outraged by the idea of autoworkers earning $57,000 a year.
A second Trump administration will cement a right-wing majority on the Supreme Court for a generation, and put our collective future in the hands of someone who will be virtually unchecked by our institutions. The country has shifted rightward, and the reverberations will ensue for potentially the next few decades. In this climate, a robust independent media ecosystem will be more important than ever. We're committed to bringing you the latest news on how Trump's agenda will actually affect the American people, shining a light on the stories corporate media overlooks and keeping the public informed about how power really works in this country.
Quality journalism is expensive to produce, and we don't have corporate backers to rely on to fund what we do. Everything we do is thanks to our incredible community of readers, who chip in a few dollars at a time to make our work possible. Any amount you give today will help us continue reporting on what matters to our democracy.