JC on a tricycle, this is a bit of a stretch isn’t it? We’re getting to the point that a journalist having their mortgage insured by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac (or possibly student loans by Sallie Mae?) is a potential conflict of interest.
Or, you know, perhaps there’s just someone doing a bit of stretching here to show how awful things are in Trump’s Amerikka? Yes, yes, that’ll be it. The only interesting thing about this is going to be observing who screams about it. Clearly, the ill-educated and dim but then that’s the marker by which we shall identify the ill-educated and dim.
Michael Cohen case shines light on Sean Hannity’s real estate empire
Fox News host who said Trump’s fixer ‘knows real estate’ has a portfolio that includes support from Department of Housing and Urban Development, a fact he did not mention when interviewing secretary Ben Carson last year
The support is that his mortgages on varied rental properties come with insurance provided by HUD.
No, really, that’s it:
Hannity, 56, also amassed part of his property collection with support from the US Department for Housing and Urban Development (Hud), a fact he did not disclose when praising Ben Carson, the Hud secretary, on his television show last year.
That support being? Our first point here would be that it was done 3 years before Carson was appointed which would be a useful thing to note. But more:
The Georgia purchases were funded with mortgages for $17.9m that Hannity obtained with help from Hud, which insured the loans under a program created as part of the National Housing Act. The loans, first guaranteed under the Obama administration, were recently increased by $5m with renewed support from Carson’s department.
Which is to giggle. This National Housing Act insurance is mortgage insurance. It’s exactly the same as that provided by Fannie or Freddie to us regular folks, it’s just that it’s for rental buildings with multiple occupancy. The terms are a little easier if you agree to rent to welfare recipients, Section 8 holders and so on. But it’s still – nominally at least but then we all know about the prices of government insurance – done on commercial and arms length terms.
Hannity pays HUD an insurance premium. HUD then guarantees that if Hannity defaults upon the mortgage then the lenders to Hannity get paid. Yes, this is exactly like Fannie and Freddie.
And this is something that supposedly creates a conflict of interest?
Sigh.
Broadcast host Sean Hannity was mentioned by Cohen, the man Permanent Special Investigator Mueller is fixating on to manufacture crimes or embarrassment against the President (who, they say, would be the cause of a Constitutional crisis if he took charge and fired Mueller and/or Sessions). Like Bill O’Reilly for sexual harassment, or Laura Ingraham for telling a high-school spoiled punk that he is behaving like a spoiled punk, the left is spattering mud everywhere to see what it can achieve, the lowest-hanging fruit being an advertiser boycott from corporations that fear adverse publicity. This is all about nothing except capturing… Read more »