One of the claims that Barack Obama repeats often (and one we’ll likely see tonight) is that he foresaw the crisis with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. He wrote a letter, he says, to the Treasury warning of the problem. That hasn’t been confirmed as far as I know, but Peter Wallison reminds WSJ readers of what Obama did when he could’ve actually acted to fix the situation: Nothing.

Finally, on the matter of deregulation and the financial crisis, Sen. Obama should consider his own complicity in the failure of Congress to adopt legislation that might have prevented the subprime meltdown.

In the summer of 2005, a bill emerged from the Senate Banking Committee that considerably tightened regulations on Fannie and Freddie, including controls over their capital and their ability to hold portfolios of mortgages or mortgage-backed securities. All the Republicans voted for the bill in committee; all the Democrats voted against it. To get the bill to a vote in the Senate, a few Democratic votes were necessary to limit debate. This was a time for the leadership Sen. Obama says he can offer, but neither he nor any other Democrat stepped forward.

Instead, by his own account, Mr. Obama wrote a letter to the Treasury Secretary, allegedly putting himself on record that subprime loans were dangerous and had to be dealt with. This is revealing; if true, it indicates Sen. Obama knew there was a problem with subprime lending — but was unwilling to confront his own party by pressing for legislation to control it. As a demonstration of character and leadership capacity, it bears a strong resemblance to something else in Sen. Obama’s past: voting present.

As Wallison notes, Obama’s essentially saying that knew there was a problem with subprime loans yet refused to actually work to fix the issue. Instead of voting for tightened regulations over Fannie and Freddie — regulations Obama has repeatedly slammed the Bush Administration for supposedly loosening — he wrote a letter to the Treasury Department. Some real leadership and action there, huh?

John McCain, by contrast, saw the problem and tried to actually fix it. He co-sponsored Chuck Hagel’s reform legislation that would’ve tightened regulations and spoke on its behalf in the Senate. He didn’t just write a letter and leave it to someone else to fix.