Being Unfair to the Right

Rep. Brad Miller has the audacity and poor taste to quote Cato and Stephen Moore from back when--on the Community Reinvestment Act and subprime loans.:

The conservative Cato Institute published an article in the fall of 2000 that said CRA should stand for Community Redundancy Act. The article argued that “progress predicated on technology, financial innovation and competition — not CRA — has broadened the U.S. financial marketplace,” including lending in neighborhoods that had once been redlined. If a lender discriminated against a low-income neighborhood, “the profit motive would lead another lender to move in and fill the void.”

Proof that increased lending in low-­income neighborhoods was not the result of requirements of the CRA, the Cato article said, was that much of the lending was by “institutions outside CRA’s jurisdiction.”

I appeared with Stephen Moore on CNBC on Oct. 25, 2007. Moore is a member of the Wall Street Journal editorial board and founded the Club for Growth. Moore said that legislation I introduced to protect homeowners from predatory mortgage lending would have a “negative effect on homeownership.” “Ultimately,” Moore said, “for all the talk of how evil the subprime lenders are, let’s not forget, you know, 94 percent of these subprime loans are paid on time. And subprime lenders have actually increased the rate of homeownership in America.”

I wonder--the Internet makes it easier to catch people of all stripes in inconsistencies and flip-flops over time. Will that eventually make us more careful in forming and voicing opinions?

No, I didn't think so.