Government title insurance: a solution looking for a problem

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Sorry, Fannie Mae: We Won't Get Fooled Again

Stephen Moore:

        Anyone remember back in 2008 when the housing market collapsed and the stock market crashed, with many tens of millions of Americans seeing their lifetime savings nearly wiped out?

Apparently the politicians in Washington are suffering amnesia -- even though it was the worst crash since the Great Depression.

        What else has been conveniently forgotten inside the swamp is that the institution that lost the most money and required the biggest tax bailout wasn't any of the major banks that teetered on the verge of bankruptcy but Fannie Mae -- the government-guaranteed enterprise that insures federal mortgages and was supposed to NEVER fail. Fanny received nearly $200 billion of taxpayer rescue funds.

        Fannie Mae, which now resides in one of the glitziest nearly 1 million-square-foot high-story office buildings in the Washington, D.C., area, is still in conservatorship. Hopefully, the Trump administration will move toward setting it free and severing all its federal strings.

        Instead, Fannie and the housing lobby wants to expand its power by forcing taxpayers to take on tens of billions of dollars of new risk by effectively eliminating title insurance on federally backed loans and replacing it with ... ta da: Fannie Mae as the de facto insurance provider on hundreds of billions of dollars of homes. What could possibly go wrong?

        Title insurance ensures that when you pay $100,000 or $1 million for a new home, you are not the victim of a fraudster, and you have rightful ownership. Private title insurance typically costs a one-time fee of 0.5% to 1% of the purchase price -- which is hardly price gouging.

        In the last months of the Biden administration, Fannie Mae proposed a federal takeover scheme under the guise of bringing down the price of buying a home. It should have received a ceremonial burial when Kamala Harris lost the election, but Fannie and the housing lobby are powerful and relentless. They say it won't cost the taxpayer a dime.

        Uh-huh. This is what Fannie and the Federal Housing Administration said when it facilitated the low down payment loans in the early 2000s that enticed Americans into homes they couldn't afford. Shortly before the 2008 crash, Fannie was even touting studies that concluded the possibility that Fannie would go bankrupt was one in a million. Whoops!

        Make no mistake: This Fannie Mae scheme is privatization in reverse. It runs a well-functioning private insurance market out of business, replacing it with government subsidized insurance coverage.

        Not only would this greatly expand Fannie Mae's charter, but it intrudes on the traditional state oversight that ensures safety and soundness of the industry. The Trump administration is about turning power back to the states, not seizing power from them.

        Congress and the Trump administration, with oversight of federal housing policy, should end this sham. Taxpayers have already been taken to the cleaners by Fannie Mae, and to quote the rock band The Who, we won't get fooled again.

(FWIW): Title insurance is pretty cheap, compared to the cost of a defect in title (it happens: in my time practicing real estate law, I encountered a defective deed — a property owner three transactions down the chain had died intestate, and and two elderly nieces still had an inchoate interest — fences and driveways built on neighbors’ property; even a forged deed in the chain of title. The insurance, though rarely needed, is great to have if a need arises.The systems not broken, so don’t fix it.

Tesla Justice

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Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty recently gained notoriety for not prosecuting a Minnesota government employee for committing a series of felonies for keying Teslas. It was a travesty, one made even more blatant by the fact that her office is prosecuting a woman for causing much less damage, vandalizing one car instead of six Teslas.

Moriarty is, of course, a Soros prosecutor in the mold of Chesa Boudin. And, as a Soros prosecutor, her veneration for the law is about as great as Joe Biden's or Nancy Pelosi's veneration for Catholic doctrine on abortion and family life. 

Fresh off her farcical application of the law in Dylan Adams' case, she is implementing a policy--starting tomorrow--that requires prosecutors in her office to use race as a consideration when pursuing and resolving cases. 

Don't blame this one on DOGE — it's been in the works for a while — but WTF?

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“morons”

Coast Guard proposes removing navigation buoys from Maine waters — the entire east coast, in fact

The U.S. Coast Guard has proposed to remove navigation aids from up and down the East Coast, including more than 100 in Maine waters.

A notice issued on April 15 listing the locations of buoys that would be discontinued, includes more than 40 in Penobscot Bay and a dozen from around Mount Desert Island.

The buoys targeted for removal mark harbor entrances, ledges, and other routes and hazards. Some are lighted, while others have gongs, bells or whistles, according to detailed descriptions in the notice.

According to the Coast Guard, most, if not all would be removed to modernize a constellation of navigation aids “whose designs mostly predate global navigation satellite systems, electronic navigation charts, and electronic charting systems.”

The intention, the Coast Guard says, is to “support the navigational needs of the 21st century prudent mariner … Deliver effective, economical service — manage vessel transit risk to acceptable levels at acceptable cost.” 

Admittedly, (most) everyone’s happy to see government spending slashed, until their own ox shows up on the chopping block, but ensuring the safety of and making possible coastal navigation has been one of the federal government’s responsibilities since the founding of the nation*, and that need still exists, especially for recreational vessels, many of which, like my own small sailboats and runabouts in the past, lack electronic navigation equipment, but even commercial vessels can have electronic failures, and the ubiquitous cell phones “everyone” carries can fail. In short, this is not a Peruvian transgender dance group.

Furthermore, it’s not all that difficult to imagine a cyberattack or an EMP, natural or deliberate, disabling the entire electronic navigation system. In that event, good luck entering a harbor or navigating shoals in fog or on a dark and stormy night.

For some reason, this bit of idiocy is being reported on mostly in Maine, but it will affect boaters from Florida to the Canadian border (and the Great Lakes are bound to be next).

The Coast Guard is accepting public comment until June 13.

Interested Mariners are strongly encouraged to comment on this in writing, either personally or through their organization. All comments will be carefully considered and are requested prior to 13 June 2025 to complete the process. To most effectively consider your feedback and improve the data collection, when responding to this proposal, please include size and type of vessel, recreational or commercial, and distance from aid that you start looking for it, and if and how you use the signal. Please do not call the Coast Guard via telephone or other means, only written responses to this proposal will be accepted. Refer to Project No. 01-25-015. E-mail can be sent to: D01-SMBDPWPublicComments@uscg.mil .

Seems like something that local yacht clubs might want to bring to the attention of their members, and act on.

*History

The Lighthouse Act of 1789, also known as "An Act for the Establishment and Support of Light-Houses, Beacons, Buoys, and Public Piers," was a significant piece of early federal legislation. It established the federal government's authority over lighthouses and other navigational aids, shifting responsibility from individual states. This act was the first federal public works program, and it was passed early in the new nation's history, even before Congress established salaries for itself. 

Gates and other megalomaniacs have been proposing this plan since at least 2010, but now a Britain set on self-destruction is coming closer to implementing it

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Goodbye to all that

(Instapundit)

WHAT COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG? ‘Sun-Dimming’ Aerosol Injections Into Atmosphere For Climate Change.

“Experiments to dim sunlight to fight global warming will be given the green light by the Government within weeks,” British outlet The Telegraph reports. “Outdoor field trials which could include injecting aerosols into the atmosphere, or brightening clouds to reflect sunshine, are being considered by scientists as a way to prevent runaway climate change.”

Don’t worry about the potential devastating and irreversible effects of blocking out the literal singular object that provides the basis for all life on Earth; the agency launching the project — the Advanced Research and Invention Agency (Aria) — assures the public its project will be “rigorously assessed.”

UPDATE (From Ed): That excess of sunlight could be put to great use in England. But to paraphrase the Gipper, sometimes the left hand doesn’t know what the far left hand is doing:

(Link to X isn’t working as I post, so I’m going with just a picture)

More here: ‘Sun-Dimming’ Aerosol Injections Into Atmosphere for Climate Change

Related: Dimming the sun might in fact be a good thing for the environment if it makes solar farms inpractical, because they’re gobbling up open land and farms, with disastrous effects:

Land Needs for Wind, Solar Dwarf Nuclear Plant’s Footprint

Wind farms require up to 360 times as much land area to produce the same amount of electricity as a nuclear energy facility, a Nuclear Energy Institute analysis has found. Solar photovoltaic (PV) facilities require up to 75 times the land area.

A nuclear energy facility has a small area footprint, requiring about 1.3 square miles per 1,000 megawatts of installed capacity. This figure is based on the median land area of the 59 nuclear plant sites in the United States. In addition, nuclear energy facilities have an average capacity factor of 90 percent, much higher than intermittent sources like wind and solar.

By contrast, wind farm capacity factors range from 32 to 47 percent, depending on differences in wind resources in a given area and improvements in turbine technology. Solar PV capacity factors also vary based on location and technology, from 17 to 28 percent.

Taking these factors into account, a wind farm would need an installed capacity between 1,900 megawatts and 2,800 MW to generate the same amount of electricity in a year as a 1,000-MW nuclear energy facility. Such a facility would require between 260 square miles and 360 square miles of land.

A solar PV facility must have an installed capacity of 3,300 MW and 5,400 MW to match a 1,000-MW nuclear facility’s output, requiring between 45 and 75 square miles.

For comparison, the District of Columbia’s total land area is 68 square miles. The island of Manhattan is 34 square miles, and New York City’s five boroughs (Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, Staten Island and the Bronx) take up 305 square miles.

No wind or solar facility currently operating in the United States is large enough to match the output of a 1,000-MW nuclear reactor. The country’s largest wind farm, Alta Wind Energy Center in California, has an installed capacity of 1,548 MW. The largest solar PV plants are the 550-MW Topaz Solar Farm and Desert Sunlight Solar Farm, both in California. Between six and 10 of these facilities would be needed to equal the annual output of the average nuclear reactor.

And:

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I'd say we've hit peak hypocrisy , but the day and the year are both still young

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In case you don’t care to go back two posts to refresh your memory about the actions of Wisconsin judge Hannah Dugan and her actions assisting defendant Eduardo Flores Ruiz escape arrest by ICE agents, here’s the relevant summary:

“This guy was in court being prosecuted by a state prosecutor for domestic violence battery. He had beat up two people, a guy and a girl, beat the guy, hit the guy 30 times, knocked him to the ground, choked him, beat up a woman so badly, they both had to go to the hospital.” 

The victims “were sitting in the courtroom with the state prosecutor, the judge learns that ICE was outside to get the guy because he had been deported in 2013, came back in our country, commits these crimes and is charged with committing these crimes. Victims are in court, the judge finds out” ICE is there to arrest him, “she goes out in the hallway, screams at the immigration officers, she's furious, visibly shaken upset, sends them off to talk to the chief judge. She comes back in the courtroom, takes the defendant and the defense attorney back in her chambers, takes them out the private exit and tells them to leave, while a state prosecutor and victims of domestic violence are sitting in the court room.”

That’s not a good story line for Democrats to use in their “Constitutional Crisis” schtick, just as “Maryland Man’s” history of wife beating, human trafficking and drug dealing proved so uncomfortable, so they ignore it completely and simply stick with the Trump is a Nazi theme that’s so popular among their illiterate subjects.

Do you remember when the Leftists spent their time shrieking that “No one is above the law”? They hope you don’t, because their concern was never genuine, and served merely as a tool to bash Trump. They care no more about that moral position than they did about “due process of law” while Obama was deporting 3 million illegal aliens during his watch — without individual hearings for all three million, as is now being demanded by the Democrats and their judges.

Just because it’s fun to detour down Memory Lane, here’s a clip of The Light Bringer from back during his reign, boasting about his accomplishment, and the importance of protecting our borders:

Even pipsqueak Congressmen chimed in,

And washed-up old movie actors. Will we hear from Neil Notsoyoung next?

Repartions

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Two commenters on the above Tweet take issue with it, claiming that is has nothing to do with race. Here’s a link to the actual bill: you decide for yourself.

25HB 1696

…Finance programs. …special purpose credit programs created under this section to black, indigenous, and people of color and other historically marginalized communities in Washington state,

Sec. 1. RCW 43.181.040 and 2023 c 340 s are each amended to read as follows: (1) As part of the covenant homeownership program, the department shall contract with the commission to design, develop, implement, and evaluate one or more special purpose credit programs to reduce racial disparities in homeownership in the state by providing down payment and closing cost assistance. The contract must authorize the commission to use the contract funding as follows:

….

(4) To be eligible to receive down payment and closing cost assistance through a special purpose credit program authorized under this section, a special purpose credit program applicant must:

  • Have a household income at or below ((100)) 120 percent of the area median income for the county where the home is located;

  • Be a first-time homebuyer; and

  • Be a Washington state resident who:

  • (A) Was a Washington state resident on or before the enactment of the federal fair housing act (Title VIII of the civil rights act of 1968; April 11, 1968, and was or would have been excluded [go ahead and prove that one — Ed] from homeownership in Washington state by a racially restrictive real estate covenant on or before April 11, 1968; or

  • Is a descendant of a person who meets the criteria in (c)(i)(A) of this subsection;

Hang her high

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Here's More from Pam Bondi About the Illegal Alien Judge Dugan Was Helping Evade ICE

“This guy was in court being prosecuted by a state prosecutor for domestic violence battery. He had beat up two people, a guy and a girl, beat the guy, hit the guy 30 times, knocked him to the ground, choked him, beat up a woman so badly, they both had to go to the hospital.” 

The victims “were sitting in the courtroom with the state prosecutor, the judge learns that ICE was outside to get the guy because he had been deported in 2013, came back in our country, commits these crimes and is charged with committing these crimes. Victims are in court, the judge finds out” ICE is there to arrest him, “she goes out in the hallway, screams at the immigration officers, she's furious, visibly shaken upset, sends them off to talk to the chief judge. She comes back in the courtroom, takes the defendant and the defense attorney back in her chambers, takes them out the private exit and tells them to leave, while a state prosecutor and victims of domestic violence are sitting in the court room.”

And of course …

Judicial warfare continues

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In theory, federal cases are assigned at random to particular judges, but there can be no doubt that the current judicial warfare against Trump and his actions is being conducted with the cooperation of the courts, acting in concert with the various leftists by allowing them to cherry pick their preferred, biased judges. “Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, three times is enemy action". Every time, is war.

Federal judge Boasberg, he of “bring them back” fame, is one example; Juan Merchan, who presided over the mockery of the “Hush Money” trial in NYC is another. Here are two more who were in the news just this week:

Judge who blocked Trump from cutting funding to sanctuary cities has deep ties to Democratic Party

An Obama-appointed federal judge in California who issued a ruling blocking the Trump administration from cutting funding to sanctuary cities has deep financial ties to the Democratic Party, records indicate.

The judge has also spoken at events in support of former Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Barack Obama and held leadership roles on committees to elect Obama and John Kerry.

Judge William Orrick of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California issued a ruling on Thursday that said President Donald Trump’s executive orders against sanctuary cities are unconstitutional.

Orrick said that Trump’s orders instructing Attorney General Pam Bondi and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to withhold federal funds from sanctuary cities and counties that do not cooperate with federal immigration law would violate the Constitution’s separation of powers principles and the Spending Clause, as well as the Fifth and 10th Amendments. 

….

According to donation records stored in the Federal Election Commission database, Orrick, who was nominated by Obama in 2012, has donated $113,600 to Democratic candidates and committees throughout the years.

Democrats that Orrick has donated to include Obama, Kerry, Hillary Clinton, Bill Clinton and Diane Feinstein.

Orrick made two donations to the Obama Victory Fund of $2,300 and $28,500 in 2008. He has also contributed a total of $53,500 to the Democratic National Committee and made a $3,000 donation to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and a $2,000 donation to the Iowa Democratic Party.

Besides his financial contributions, a Senate Judiciary Committee questionnaire further reveals that Orrick served as co-chair of the Bay Area Lawyers to Elect John Kerry 2003-2004 as well as the Bay Area Lawyers to Elect Barack Obama 2006-2008.

Yesterday, Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly struck down Trump’s executive order requiring proof of citizenship in federal elections. Here are some of her previous rulings, per Wikipedia:

  • On March 19, 2009, in response to a joint lawsuit brought by the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, the National Parks Conservation Association and the Coalition of National Park Service Retirees, Kollar-Kotelly issued a preliminary injunction whereby she blocked a rule that would permit visitors to national parks to carry concealed weapons. The change of rule which she blocked had been enacted by the United States Department of the Interior after being supported by 51 members of Congress and passing an extended public comments period. She stated that her decision to block the change of rule was because there was no environmental analysis performed and therefore the Interior Department "ignored (without sufficient explanation) substantial information in the administrative record concerning environmental impacts" of the rule.

  • On March 7, 2016, she denied a requested preliminary injunction against Washington, D.C.'s discretionary issue of concealed carry permits, thereby allowing DC police chief Cathy Lanier to continue denying concealed carry permits to law-abiding citizens in most cases.

  • In 2017, Kollar-Kotelly presided over ACLU v. Trump and Pence.

  • On October 30, 2017, Kollar-Kotelly blocked the enforcement of President Donald Trump's ban on transgender individuals from serving in the military.

  • On May 14, 2024, Kollar-Kotelly sentenced Lauren Handy to 57 months in prison and three years of supervised release for her part in blocking access to an abortion clinic, a violation of the FACE Act.

  • On May 31, Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly sentenced Paulette "Paula" Harlow to two years in federal prison and 36 months of supervised release for violating the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act (FACE Act) during a pro-life demonstration at an abortion clinic in 2020. During sentencing, Kollar-Kotelly addressed concerns raised by Harlow’s husband, John, and her attorney, who pleaded for leniency due to her rapidly declining health, warning that imprisonment could endanger her life. In response, the judge referenced Harlow’s religious beliefs, stating:

  • "I would suggest that, in terms of your religion, one of the tenets is that you should make the effort, during this period of time—when it may be difficult for your husband—to do what is necessary to survive, because that's part of the tenets of your religion."

  • In October 2024, Kollar-Kotelly found Dominic Box, who participated in the January 6, 2021 United States Capitol Attack, guilty on six charges. Before Box's scheduled sentencing date, he was pardoned by Donald Trump. Kollar-Kotelly criticized Trump's blanket pardons for those involved in the January 6 Capitol attack.

  • On February 6, 2025, Kollar-Kotelly issued a temporary ruling limiting the Department of Government Efficiency's access to the Treasury Department's payment system, which plaintiffs allege would allow the Department to access the personal information of millions of Americans. She arranged a hearing for February 24, 2025 to consider a preliminary injunction.

  • In a 120-page ruling on April 24, 2025, Kollar-Kotelly blocked part of Trump's executive order that would require people to prove U.S. citizenship before registering to vote. She wrote that the states and Congress, not the president, have the power to regulate elections.

Trump is trying to accomplish by executive order what Congress should have done decades ago: overrule Griggs v Duke Power, but he can’t do it alone.

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A unanimous Supreme Court ruled in the 1971 case of Griggs vs Duke Power that the discrimination prohibited by the 1964 Civil Rights act can be demonstrated by “disparate-impact”: proof of a lack of intent to discriminate was irrelevant.

In that era, the focus was on racial discrimination, but the term rapidly expanded to encompass discrimination against anyone except able-bodied white male cisgenders, so it can be said that Griggs began the dismantling of all merit systems in hiring, education, law enforcement and, really, just about every facet of American society. DEI is just its latest metastasis. Now, Trump has issued an executive order seeking to reverse that; he may have some limited success, although legal challenges will probably keep it tied up for years, but it’s only a temporary fix at best, and it will be up to Congress to fix it “permanently” — until the next time the Democrats regain control of the government, that is.

Hot Air’s John Sexton explains:

Yesterday, President Trump signed an executive order titled "Restoring Equality of Opportunity and Meritocracy." The basic point of this is to undermine what is known as disparate-impact theory.

….[T] he order requires several actions which are summarized in an accompanying fact sheet published by the White House.

  • The Order revokes presidential actions that approved of disparate-impact liability and sets in motion broader reform.

  • It directs all agencies to deprioritize enforcement of statutes and regulations that include disparate-impact liability.

  • The Order instructs the Attorney General to repeal or amend all Title VI (racial nondiscrimination) regulations that contemplate disparate-impact liability.

  • It directs the administration to assess all pending investigations, lawsuits, and consent judgements that rely on a theory of disparate-impact liability, and take appropriate action.

City Journal's Heather Mac Donald has more: she argues it's the "most important step" to restore meritocracy in America.

…. Disparate-impact theory holds that if a neutral, colorblind standard of achievement or behavior has a disproportionately negative effect on underrepresented minorities (overwhelmingly, on blacks), it violates civil rights laws. It has been used to invalidate literacy and numeracy standards for police officers and firemen, cognitive skills and basic knowledge tests for teachers, the use of SATs in college admissions, the use of grades for medical licensing exams, credit-based mortgage lending, the ability to discipline insubordinate students, and criminal background checks for employees and renters. It has been used to eliminate prosecution for a large range of crimes, including shoplifting, turnstile jumping, and resisting arrest; to end police tactics such as proactive stops (otherwise known as stop, question, and frisk); and to purge safety technologies like ShotSpotter and speeding cameras from police departments.

In none of those cases has it ever been demonstrated that the disfavored standard was implemented to exclude blacks or other minorities from a position, opportunity, or right. The genius (if a diabolical one) of disparate-impact theory was that it obviated any need to show discriminatory intent on the part of a targeted employer or institution. Discrimination was inferred simply by the effect of the colorblind standard.

Disparate-impact theory preserved the hegemony of the civil rights regime long after the original impetus for that regime had all but disappeared. One would be hard-pressed today to find any mainstream institution that discriminates against blacks in admissions, hiring, or promotion. The reality, in fact, is the opposite: every mainstream institution is desperate to hire and promote as many remotely qualified blacks as possible; it is white males who are disfavored and excluded from positions based on their skin color.

….

Disparate-impact analysis was the linchpin of the “systemic racism” argument, since the only present-day proof of racism in American society is the underrepresentation of blacks in the professions and their overrepresentation in the criminal-justice system.

Meantime, the real cause of disparate impact—the yawning academic skills and crime gaps—was kept assiduously offstage.

Now all that may be changing. The presidential Executive Order of April 23, 2025, “Restoring Equality of Opportunity and Meritocracy,” sets out the policy of the United States to “eliminate the use of disparate-impact liability in all contexts to the maximum degree possible.”

To that end, it starts the process of repealing disparate-impact regulations accreted to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by subsequent administrations and requires the cataloguing of state laws that impose disparate-impact liability, among other actions.

Most momentously for law enforcement, the executive order initiates the review of federal consent decrees that rely on disparate-impact analysis (i.e., almost all of them), with the implied goal of dissolving those decrees. (A consent decree is a negotiated settlement, overseen by a judge and his representative, binding a government entity to an elaborate set of reforms.) Dissolving such decrees will not only liberate police departments from a costly yoke of superfluous red tape but will also defund the federal monitor racket, whereby monitors earn millions of dollars declaring for years on end that the overseen police department has yet to comply punctiliously with an average of 200 or so mandated reforms, often regarding paperwork.

Left-wing groups are understandably up in arms. They charge the administration with a “fundamental shift in legal philosophy.” That is true, but it was disparate-impact theory itself that constituted a radical departure from the premises of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. President Donald Trump merely restores the 1964 law to its original understanding. That pioneering legislation banned intentional discrimination only; disparate-impact theory was a judicial amendment made six years later in response to how, even in 1971, finding invidious intentional discrimination was becoming too difficult to satisfy the advocates.

The Left complains as well that Trump’s’ executive order embraces a “formalist, colorblind conception of equality.” Yes—and so does the Constitution.

McDonald closes with this warning:

President Trump and his Cabinet must move quickly. His executive order can be reversed by a hostile successor administration; the disparate-impact regime can be resurrected with another flip of the presidential pen. The White House needs to persuade Congress to clarify that civil rights mean freedom from discrimination—not the legitimization of “reverse discrimination.” Congress must amend 1960s-era statutes to confirm explicitly their original colorblind intent.