Who Caused the Economic Crisis?

The "fact" checkers state; "What Gramm-Leach-Bliley did was to allow commercial banks to get into investment banking. "

This co-mingling of investment and commercial banking is PRECISELY what many people view as one of the underlying factors that resulted in the current econmic crisis. Yet this article claims that it's "bunk" to blame the act for anything. The act by itself may not have been responsible, but it was one of the importtant factors. There were many other factors, but the most lmportant of all has been the Republican belief that dergulation is always good and regulation is always bad, plus Bush'shabit of appointing corporate foxes to guard the public's hen houses.

Factcheck should stick to checking facts and not making economic "analyses" (also known as "opinions.") The MoveOn ad may have stretched the truth about this act, but It sometimes seems that FactCheck itself really stretches the truth in order to always spread blame equally. Well, in the real world, sometimes the blame is NOT shared equally, and this is one of those times.

Sounds like there's more than enough blame to go around. Finger-pointing has become the number one American past-time, surpassing baseball, football, eating and spending. Or should I say, borrowing.

If we accept that everyone had a hand in this mess, that allows us to start moving to solution, instead of staying in the problem.

Rather than waste so much time and energy on pointing fingers, let's put the energy into figuring out what is broken, and how to fix it.

Worrying about who did or didn't do something or say something, at this point, is a luxury we can no longer afford.

Hello fact check. Go back to the CRA in 1977 (Jimmy Carter-D), and the 1995 reform (William Clinton-D). This is what started the lending to low-income families, and was pushed into subprime mortgages without regulations. Go forward to September 11, 2003, (George H. W. Bush-R) proposed an oversight bodey to monitor Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac's combined $1.5 Trillion in outstanding debt. What happend next was staggering.

"Significant details must still be worked out before Congress can approve a bill. Among the groups denouncing the proposal today were the National Association of Home Builders and Congressional Democrats who fear that tighter regulation of the companies could sharply reduce their commitment to financing low-income and affordable housing.

''These two entities -- Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- are not facing any kind of financial crisis,'' said Representative Barney Frank of Massachusetts, the ranking Democrat on the Financial Services Committee. ''The more people exaggerate these problems, the more pressure there is on these companies, the less we will see in terms of affordable housing.''

Representative Melvin L. Watt, Democrat of North Carolina, agreed.

''I don't see much other than a shell game going on here, moving something from one agency to another and in the process weakening the bargaining power of poorer families and their ability to get affordable housing,'' Mr. Watt said.

What strikes me the most in this article is the mention of Chris Dodd and Barney Frank being against tighter regulation for Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac. Weren't they the ones making such partisan statements against the Republicans and Bush about the current economic crisis. I don't understand how people can be so deceptive and irresponsible. They take no responsiblity for how their decisions helped cause this debacle. Their constituents should run them out of office!!!

Plenty of blame to go around-let's just fix it!

Even This Article is biases. Because John McCain warned of this problem as early as 3 years ago.

HOPEFULLY YOU RECEIVED THE LAST BLOG

Like I have always said. This all started with the Clinton administration. Clinton blew up this balloon and kept blowing into it until it finally popped with his failure to keep his pants on and for the Enron scandal. There was never any money out there it was all a bunch of hot air. For the democrats to keep blaming the Republicans is all a bunch of crap it is every human that stands back and denies that there is nothing going on until it is too late. People open your eyes and stop acting like you are just here on earth to breathe. Take a stand for what you believe in wether right or wrong believe in it and make it a voice.

The author blames:
-Home buyers, who took advantage of easy credit to bid up the prices of homes excessively. (I know when I bought MY home I made sure it was within my budget. I had to delay closings several times because mortgage brokers tried to gouge me on interest)
- Mortgage brokers, who offered less-credit-worthy home buyers subprime, adjustable rate loans with low initial payments, but exploding interest rates. (There's some truth here. Trying to get one to estimate how high an ARM might go was like pulling teeth. I opted for FRM, and eventually got it)
-Congress, which continues to support a mortgage tax deduction that gives consumers a tax incentive to buy more expensive houses. (I ask you, who in their right mind would do that? I didn't use the deduction to buy a more expensive house. That would be like holding a bake sale to fix Wall Street's problems.)
Collective delusion, or a belief on the part of all parties that home prices would keep rising forever, no matter how high or how fast they had already gone up. (I, for one, do not consider my primary residence an investment. Sure, I want it to at least hold its value, but we all have to live somewhere, and if it's paid off, I don't have a large monthly payment to worry about)

Who is t5o blame? Who is in charge and responsible for regulating and insuring at least baseline requirements are met. Sounds to me like the guy minding the store is responsible.

Mr Miller and Mr Jackson, thanks for info. The more I read the better I understand this mess.

If this mess has or should teach the young people....do not spend more than you make.

The only blessing is.....Thank God...they (Congress REP/DEM & George Bush..did not privatize Soical Security...which is also going to need bailing out very soon...

I had little ...I have loss a lot in my 401K....now I have less...I hope to be working until I die....

Change is coming.....may we all be better off when it is over....

God Bless America

Enough blame to go around, no doubt. But how to FIX it? At least listen to Ron Paul, who has been right all along,but he gets a little air time while we listen to all the "experts" drone on and on.

It's interesting that Katie from Dallas thanks the author's for writing this article, and bemoans the "blame game." Of course she goes on to blame the Republicans anyway and then goes on to say that the Democrats were "looking out for the little guys in the 90's." Did she read the article? It's not all greed and failure to act on the part of government and Wall Street that is pinching the middle class, it's our own stupidity and irresponsible spending on the part of individual Americans that is the bigger danger.

This mornings Wall St. Journal just keeps on cranking out the Barney Frank hits. Like this one from 2004:

''I think we need to roll the dice''

The ''dice''being more unregulated loans to high-risk borrowers.

Then too,there is the conspicuous absence in the discussion of Sen.Dodds acceptance of ''sweetheart''loan deals from COUNTRYWIDE,while he was both minority ranking member and Chairman of the Senate Banking Commitee from 2005-2007. A federal grand jury in Los Angeles is looking into this as we write. It will be to NEWSWEAK to display their mettle as being anything but in-the-can for the Democrats,should the results of this investigation bring more heat upon Dodd.[as they have been officially out to a partisan lunch in their total blackout of coverage of the federal investigation and ethics hearing of House Ways and Means Chairman Charlie Rangel].

Thanks for pointing out the spin on both sides, the blame game is irresponsible and doesn't help resolve the crisis. I think people need to be spoon-fed their economics by nonpartisan efforts more often so they avoid recycling right or left talking points and GET THE FACTS. Republicans & Greenspan had the last 8 years to combat this bubble burst, yet they failed to bring bills to the table and neglected middle class in favor of wall street deregulation, the Dems were looking out for the little guys in the 90s and helping more people get affordable housing w/ lower rates. Because of the greed and failure to act, more and more Americans face debt and difficulty getting homes. It is an endless cycle that will see the middle class pinch become a crunch before its over. I fear for all Americans who make less than 100k a year. No more republican-backed greed in the white house, it never trickled down anyway.

www.youtube.com/TheMouthPeace

Please keep passing on this video. We need every one of the mainstream t.v. news media (ABC, NBC, CBS) as well as major newspapers to run a story on this! Obama's minions keep trying to shut it down but we MUST find a way to get it to as many people as possible!