McCain Defends Homeowner Plan

[April 12, 2008]  LUBBOCK, Texas (AP) -- Republican John McCain defended his latest plan to help some homeowners pay their mortgages, saying Friday it was not a reversal of his earlier opposition to aggressive intervention by the government.

The likely Republican presidential nominee on Thursday proposed to help 200,000 to 400,000 homeowners trade burdensome mortgages for manageable loans, a plan that would cost $3 billion to $10 billion.

Democratic rivals Sens. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama argued that McCain was flip-flopping. Last month, he said he preferred only limited intervention and letting market forces play out, drawing criticism from Democrats and some Republicans that he was being indifferent to Americans facing foreclosures and other economic pain.

McCain said their criticism was "just factually incorrect."

"I said there shouldn't be a broad government bailout," he told reporters Friday in Dallas.

"But I said very clearly - and I'd be glad to get a record of what I said - I said the government has to enact reform to prevent the kind of crisis we have, and there was a role for government, and I supported a bipartisan solution," McCain said.

His plan falls in the middle; it would help twice as many homeowners as President Bush and fewer than half as many as congressional Democrats.

McCain held a rally Friday in an airport hangar after holding fundraisers in Dallas and Lubbock.

"I think you all know," he told the crowd in Lubbock, "Americans are sitting around the kitchen table, and they're trying to figure out a way to keep their home and realize the American dream."

[Associated Press]

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