Big lie exposed - No such thing as free markets

I woke up this morning to the headline on Yahoo news that the U.S. government is going to take over two of the largest mortgage companies in the United States. So much for free markets.

Of course, the government took over Bear Sterns a couple of months ago trying to prop up the investment companies.

The Republican nonsense about free markets is peddled to the working class and poor but the upper middle class and rich know that there is no such thing as free markets. Markets are manipulated by the rich, monied class and they are in bed with the government officials to line their pockets. When their schemes don't work, the government steps in to bail them out. This is another example of capitalism out of control. Here is a snippet from the Yahoo web site:

By ALAN ZIBEL, AP Business Writer 45 minutes ago

WASHINGTON - The government is expected to take over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac as soon as this weekend in a monumental move designed to protect the mortgage market from the failure of the two companies, which together hold or guarantee half of the nation's mortgage debt, a person briefed on the matter said Friday night.

Some of the details of the intervention, which could cost taxpayers billions, were not yet available, but are expected to include the departure of Fannie Mae CEO Daniel Mudd and Freddie Mac CEO Richard Syron, according to the source, who asked not to be named because the plan was yet to be announced.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and James Lockhart, the companies' chief regulator, met Friday afternoon with the top executives from the mortgage companies and informed them of the government's plan to put the troubled companies into a conservatorship.