Big Mac Panic Attack

Peter Overby at NPR:

Fannie and Freddie have kept their profiles high because of their odd situation: They're not government agencies, but they're not regular corporations either. As government sponsored enterprises, or GSEs, they're often thought to have guarantees of federal support. It lets them get discounts when they borrow money.

To maintain that advantage and others, they hire well-placed politicos for big salaries.

A rival lobbyist once described Fannie Mae as a political organization that happened to be in the mortgage business.

Italics added.

What Overby, a very sharp reporter, is describing could be termed a "rhetorical object." This is not the guarantee of the federal government, but the appearance of that guarantee, the promise of a promise. The underlying blurry charter, history, and function of the Macs depend on the actions of a market that is constantly in need of being persuaded that something that could be true, or could just as well be illusory. Its status is constantly being contested and depends not upon a legal determination but upon the greasification of certain surprisingly august palms.

According to The Center for Investigative Reporting, the gaggle of palms, a distributed chorus of hortatory specialists, includes the likes of James A Johnson, Louis J. Freeh, Rahm Emanuel, Susan Molinari and more who work to maintain this state of affairs because upon its undecided status rests a good portion of their income as well as a considerable portion of their juice:

In the first three months of the year alone, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac spent a combined total of about $3.5 million on lobbying and hired 42 outside firms.

If the object that undergirds so much of the housing, lending, and credit industry worldwide indeed is rhetorical in nature, rather than stable, fixed, and "guaranteed," it might be useful in public discussion to acknowledge this, rather than proceed as if the question of the Big Macs' promise were, in the reductive sense alone, rhetorical.

Update: Another take at Gifthub.