I think the sort of people who ran (and run) the financial industry leveraged the political sentiments behind the Community Reinvestment Act for their own personal gains. It should be noted that the CRA got legislative changes in 1999 (enacted November 12, 1999, Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, a.k.a. "Financial Services Modernization Act") that are co-incident with the repeal of the part of the Glass–Steagall Act which prohibited a particular bank from offering a full range of investment, commercial banking, and insurance services since its enactment in 1933.

It's quite eye-opening to see all that the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act did (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Community_Reinvestment_Act#Leg...) in terms of rolling back the standards for CRA compliance, forms of allowed banking under one roof, and failure to give to the SEC or any other financial regulatory agency the authority to regulate large investment bank holding companies.

I don't know the particulars about Fannie Mae's pilot program in 1999, but it and Freddie Mac, while both Government Sponsored Entities, were both expected to operate much the same as any commercial for-profit enterprise. The people who ran (and run) them come from the same talent pool that runs the rest of the industry.

Just my opinion, but it seems to me that much rides on how much "churn" a financial company can do. Churn as in sales in financial services which include the repackaging of other financial "products" into a new ones. Compensation for most of the people involved is a straightforward percentage of sales, independent of actual profitability or long-term sustainability for the company (let alone their clients).

By "the Conservatives" I'm (safely) assuming you mean mostly GOP politicians. I'm also assuming you well understand the connections between politics and money. Their apparent changes in their collective views are nothing more than the usual specious talking-points one has come to expect from political animals. Their choices of talking-points are regularly "re-balanced" with the political winds.

The political timeline is quite simple. Before the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, the CRA was doing no favors for the financial industry, hence the decries from representatives who "feel-the-pain" from that segment of their constituency. Then the Act is passed, regulations are dropped, allowable banking services expanded (CitiGroup is now legal!), subprime mortgages spur even more home ownership (that's what the CRA was about, right?), Wall Street gets to do the Fannie Mae/Freddy Mac thing but in their own inimical ways (liar loans anyone? but, shhh, nobody knows anything about that yet) - so it's churn! churn! churn!

So for a while the financial industry was making big bucks, banks can originate subprime loans profitably to "satisfy" CRA, poor people and minorities can now get houses - so what's not to love? So the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act is a smashing success, and it is very much a GOP idea. What GOP type is going to make noises about Fannie Mae/Freddy Mac now when their buddies in finance are doing rather much the same thing?

And then the 2008 crash, and fingers are pointed at the culprits: It was the CRA! (a half-truth); It was the repeal of Glass–Steagall Act (3/4 truth). Mostly I see it as the consequence of rolling-back or repealing so many regulations, restrictions, and standards that have accrued over the decades in response to various crises of the past. The industry mostly wants to do as it pleases and will push to be as unfettered as it can get. I'm guessing we're in agreement here.