Obama now supports ending Fannie and Freddy. When Palin said Fannie/Freddie were too expensive to taxpayers in ’08, it was a “gaffe”

To call news people stupid is an insult to stupid people.  Back in 2008, the press was calling it Palin's first gaffe.

Palin:

“John McCain has been calling for years to reform things and cut bureaucracy, even at the lending agencies that our government supports. The fact is Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have gotten too big and too expensive to the taxpayers. The McCain-Palin administration will make them smaller and smarter and more effective for homeowners who need help.”

The press, perhaps with the connivance of "Journo-list" decided that this sage advice was incredibly stupid.

McClatchy:

The companies, however, aren’t taxpayer funded but operate as private companies. The takeover may result in a taxpayer bailout during reorganization.

Sam Stein at Huffington Post, who dubbed it Palin’s “first gaffe.”

Economists and analysts pounced on the misstatement, which came before the government had spent funds bailing the two entities out, saying it demonstrated a lack of understanding about one of the key economic issues likely to face the next administration.

“You would like to think that someone who is going to be vice president and conceivable president would know what Fannie and Freddie do,” said Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research. “These are huge institutions and they are absolutely central to our country’s mortgage debt. To not have a clue what they do doesn’t speak well for her, I’d say.”

Added Andrew Jakabovics, an economic analyst for the progressive think tank, Center for American Progress:

“It is somewhat nonsensical because up until yesterday there was sort of no public funding there. Even today they haven’t drawn down any of the credit line they have given to Treasury. ‘Gotten too big and too expensive’ are two separate things. The too big has been a conservative mantra for a while and there is something to be said of that in that they hold about half of the mortgage guarantees that are out there. And in the last year they have been responsible for roughly 80 percent out there. The ‘too expensive to tax payers,’ I don’t know where that comes from.”

Jake Tapper:

“Too expensive to the taxpayers?”

They’re private entities.

Though they’re private entities ultimately backed up by the taxpayers.

But the only way Fannie and Freddie are “too expensive to the taxpayers” is if you’re talking about the bailout announced over the weekend.

Is that what she meant?

So, does “too expensive” mean that Palin opposes the bailout?

Or did she misstate how these entities function?

Of course the bailouts cost the taxpayers several hundred billions and the ensuing wreckage costs thousands their homes. But one of the benefits of being consistently wrong in the news business is to never have to say you're sorry. In fact, one of these dunces, Jake Tapper is regarded today as being one of the few reporters that occasionally commits random acts of journalism and is one of the members of the press corps that is often praised by certain parts of the Right.  The fact that he's a stupid ass who is sometimes less objectionable as his brethren still makes him a stupid ass.