Obama not serious about ending failed programs

The House voted yesterday to terminate the 8.5 billion dollar FHA Refinance Program. This program was established a little over a year ago and funded with 8.5 billion dollars of funds from TARP. It was supposed to allow homeowners to refinance mortgages which they could not longer afford. Obama said when the program began that it would help between one half million and 1.5 million homeowners.

So here is the question: how many homeowners have been helped during the first year of the program? Think about this as the theme from Jeopardy plays in the background. I will give you a hint....it is not all that many. OK, here is another hint, so far the program has spent over 50 million dollars. Give up? Here's the answer. In the first year and a quarter of the program, there have been 44 homeowners who have been able to refinance. That's right 44!!!!!!! Do the math. Each person who refinanced cost the government about 1.2 million dollars. And these were not mortgages on enormous mansions. No, the bulk of the money went to pay for the employees who were not able to do much of anything. Only a small portion covered the actual cost of refinancing. In other words, the program has been an enormous failure, a dud, a bomb, a total waste of money.

So you would think that everyone would agree that it makes sense to end this boondoggle, this failure, right? Well, here is the latest word from Obama: President Obama announced he will veto the bill because he believes that “continuation of the FHA refinancing programs is vital to the nation’s sustained economic recovery.”