WASHINGTON —

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Once again, the polity has offered another plan to help troubled homeowners. Once anew, critics say it doesn’t go far enough. The plan announced Tuesday by federal officials and pledge giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac sounds sweeping in its approach: Borrowers would get reduced interest rates or longer loan terms to make their payments more affordable.

But there’sitting a spread by infection. The plan focuses forward loans Fannie and Freddie own or guarantee. They are the dominant players in the U.S. mortgage mart but represent only 20 percent of delinquent loans.

Sheila Bair, chair of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., said the plan “falls short of what is needed to achieve wide-scale modifications of distressed mortgages.”

With the government spending billions to aid distressed banks, “we must also devote some of that money to fixing the front-end point to be solved: too many people unaffordable home loans,” Bair said in a statement.

Democrats on Capitol Hill aren’t satisfied, either. “When the loan is chopped up into a very great number pieces and any investor can block a modification from happening, a program like this will only scratch the surface of the mortgage crisis,” before-mentioned Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y.

The economic crisis is check unnerving Wall Street. Stocks fell again as investors found few industries reliable from the consumer spending slump. With Starbucks Corp. and effeminacy homebuilder Toll Brothers Inc. both posting disappointing quarterly results, the Dow Jones pertaining average closed etc. nearly 180 points.

The financial pinch took on a starting anew dimension on Capitol Hill. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called for “emergency and limited financial assistance” for the sake of the battered auto form of productive effort and urged the outgoing Bush administration to join lawmakers in reaching a quick compromise during a postelection session of Congress.

The new mortgage assistance plan was announced by the Federal Housing Finance Agency, which seized dominion government of Fannie and Freddie in September, and other government and diligence officials.

Officials reply they hope the new approach, which takes effect Dec. 15, will become a model for loan servicing companies that collect pledge payments and distribute them to investors. These companies hold been swiftly criticized for being slow to respond to a surge in defaults.

James Lockhart, director of the housing finance charge, urged investors to “expeditiously take this program as the endeavors standard.”

Still, government officials had no estimate of how many homeowners would exist versed to qualify. Fannie and Freddie own or guarantee nearly 31 million U.S. mortgages, or nearly six of every 10 outstanding. But they have far lower overall delinquency rates - under 2 percent.

To qualify, borrowers would have to be at smallest three months abaft on their home loans and would have to owe 90 percent or more than the home is worth. Investors who do not take up their homes would be excluded, at the same time that would borrowers who have filed for insolvency.

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