Outspoken congressman Barney Frank has no shortage of critics, and they're sure to be out in force today. This morning, The Wall Street Journal reported that the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, along with his colleague Anthony Weiner, is actually recommending that Fannie Mae (NYSE: FNM) and Freddie Mac (NYSE: FRE) relax their lending standards on condominiums.

The controversial request follows a decision by both Fannie and Freddie to tighten mortgage-lending standards for condos. In March, Fannie said it would no longer guarantee mortgages on condos in buildings where fewer than 70% of units have been rented, up from its previous benchmark of 51%. Freddie is due to implement similar measures in July. In a letter to the CEOs of both mortgage lenders, Reps. Frank and Weiner expressed their concerns that the higher standard "may be too onerous," and asked the lenders to "make appropriate adjustments" to their approach.

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says we're trying to repeal what happened financially last year. Will it lead to strength industrially?

How low were we really? What was the real baseline pre-Lehman Brothers? What was going on in the country and the world before that financial atomic bomb dropped?

I struggle over that now, about what the true price of copper should be, about what the true price of oil should be, about the price of steel, all kinds of things. I try to figure out what the prices for everything were going to be before Lehman.

In celebration of Barry Ritholtz's critically-acclaimed new book Bailout Nation, he held The Big Picture Conference, which I was fortunate to attend.

Here are the main points from the most reputable speakers, Congressman Alan Grayson, Nassim Taleb, Doug Kass, and Josh Rosner.

Florida Congressman Alan Grayson discussed how systemic risk is an excuse for socialism and that interconnectedness is the main reason that these institutions are "too big to fail." In fact, these institutions no longer hold social or economic purpose, they are simply too big to exist.

Did you hear? Mortgage rates are surging. That should be no surprise. All we had to do was look at the sharp sell off in US treasuries and you know that mortgage rates would follow suit. The 30 year fixed rate mortgage rate jumped to 5.29%, up from 4.91% just a week ago. On April 2nd the rate was 4.78%.

Just to give you an example in real dollar terms, let's take a $200,000 30 year fixed mortgage at 5.29%. Your monthly payment would be $1109.37 and your 30 payments would be $399,372.25. At 4.91% your monthly payment would be 1062.67 and your 30 payments would be $382,560. So in real dollar terms your cost has risen $16,812.00. In addition lenders are charging 0.7% in fees and points, unchanged from the previous week.

All in all, this was actually a light day on the news flow for major stocks. Today's dismal Case-Shiller data for a record drop in housing prices was trumped completely by a surge in consumer confidence this morning. The notion that North Korea did a nuclear bomb test was only important for discussions during the very early morning, but slowly faded thereafter.

Here are today's unofficial closing bell levels:

Dow 8,473.49 +196.17 (2.37%)
S&P 500 910.31 +23.31 (2.63%)
Nasdaq 1,750.43 +58.42 (3.45%)

Top 10 Analyst Calls

Here are some highlights from this past week's earnings coverage from BloggingStocks:

• Abercrombie & Fitch Co. (NYSE: ANF) reported dismal Q1 numbers as same-store sales plunged.
• Applied Materials Inc. (NASDAQ: AMAT) dismal Q2 results were in line with analysts' expectations.
• Bankrate Inc. (NASDAQ: RATE) reported lower earnings and revenue for Q1 and offered no guidance.
• Blockbuster Inc. (NYSE: BBI) earnings, revenue, and same-store sales all fell in the first quarter.
• Dr Pepper Snapple Group (NYSE: DPS) Q1 earnings declined but still topped analysts' expectations.

Late Tuesday, Freddie Mac (NYSE: FRE) reported that its quarterly net loss checked in at $9.9 billion thanks to rising delinquencies. The company also blamed the results on continued impairments on its holdings of mortgage-backed securities. On a per share basis, FRE's quarterly loss increased to $3.14 a share, compared to $151 million a year ago, or 66 cents a share. The mortgage lender's total revenue dropped to $771 million from $1.41 billion a year ago.

FRE put aside $8.8 billion in provisions in order to cover credit losses for the first quarter, up from $7 billion in the final quarter of 2008. FRE attributed this to the increase in the number and rate of delinquent mortgages, coupled with increasing foreclosure-related losses.

Despite the market being up the last hour, today's stock market made six changes between being up and down. Oil inventories continued their building to record or near-record levels. It was very light on the economic calendar today so traders had to use the cumulative earnings as the directional report. Even very weak global recovery targets from the IMF were ignored.

Here are today's unofficial closing bell levels:

Dow 7,886.41 -83.15 (-1.04%)
S&P 500 843.56 -6.52 (-0.77%)
Nasdaq 1,645.85 +2.00 (0.12%)

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It's times like this that all of the vitriol spewed at heads of companies seems a bit overdone. Reportedly, Freddie Mac's (NYSE: FRE) acting Chief Financial Officer, David Kellermann, has been found dead in an apparent suicide.

According to reports, Kellermann's wife found his body and alerted the authorities early this morning. While the police have yet to confirm suicide, most outlets covering the report are saying it was. And while Bloomberg is reporting the death was "unintended," it's been reported that Kellermann's wife told police it was a suicide.

According to a report today in The Wall Street Journal [subscription required], Fannie Mae (NYSE: FNM) and Freddie Mac (NYSE: FRE) -- those twin titans of mortgage mayhem -- are planning to dish out $210 million worth of retention bonuses over the next 18 months. James Lockhart, director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, explained that $51 million in payouts were distributed in late 2008, with the rest of the bonuses to be disbursed through 2009 and into early 2010.

The news is already raising politicians' ire, since Fannie and Freddie are staying afloat only through the grace of government bailouts. The two lenders reported combined losses of roughly $108 billion in 2008, says the Journal, yet 80% of Freddie's employees and 61% of Fannie's payroll will score retention bonuses based on this bleak operating performance.

Here comes the next big rip off by the banks -- mortgage origination fees. Banks normally charge what is called an "origination fee" -- an upfront payment to the bank supposedly for the paper work involved in doing the paperwork.

Just to give you an example, David Rapport, professor at the University of California Medical School had to pay $3500.00 up front to refinance his mortgage. A year ago, there was no fee! So banks are jumping in the refinancing market and charging outrageous fees just for writing a mortgage. Don't tell me that last year there was no fee and now for some magical reason banks have to charge sky high fees. The mortgage Bankers Association boosted its forecast for 2009 home loan originations by $800 billion to $2.78 trillion. This will give you a sense of the size of the market.

Who is ready for a second round of bonus outrage (dare I call it a "bonus" round)? This time it is Fannie Mae (NYSE: FNM) that has awarded retention bonuses to four of its top executives -- let's see how mad everyone gets about this one.

The mortgage company told the SEC in a recent filing that it is going to award bonuses between $470,000 to $611,000 to four of its top executives. As is the nature of a bonus, this payment is on top of the executives' already-hefty base pay.

TheStreet.com's Jim Cramer says if you don't believe the administration's action (or inaction) here will have an effect, look at Lehman.

Every time I hear that policy doesn't matter, that rules don't matter, that nothing can be done, I think two words -- "Lehman Brothers." For those of you who think that it doesn't matter what government does, ask yourself whether you would feel the same way about the world today if Lehman Brothers had been bought by another bank, and we would not have had

1. tens of billions in bonds and preferreds destroyed,
2. the buck broken,
3. tens of billions in margin accounts that vaporized,
4. a fire sale of bad assets driving all prices down,
5. a sense of chaos as you knew the government had no plan, even after Bear, Fannie (NYSE: FNM) (Cramer's Take) and Freddie (NYSE: FRE) (Cramer's Take) and everything else that happened.

Most investors know about the United States' anti-state political culture: in America it's private sector solution first, public sector solution second.

And, most also know that what state that does exist is anti-central government: it dates back to our federalist origination. We're even reluctant to call something 'central' for this reason: we have a central bank, but it's called the Federal Reserve, not the Central Reserve. And it's the Internal Revenue Service, not the Central Revenue Service.

When Fannie Mae (NYSE: FNM) and Freddie Mac (NYSE: FRE) were taken over by the government in September, both were given new CEOs to replace the clowns who got them into the mess.

Now Freddie Mac's CEO is heading for the exits. In a press release, the company said that CEO David Moffett would resign as CEO and as a member of the board no later than March 13. From the press release:

Moffett indicated that he wants to return to a role in the financial services sector. In his letter of resignation, he said, "I have enjoyed my time as CEO of Freddie Mac and I wish all the great employees the very best in the days to come."