Who is to blame for the financial crisis?

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Banks/Greedy Capitalists
Republicans
Democrats
The Government as a whole.

Who do you identify with politically?

Thanks.
I did not give any thumbs down BTW. I just wanted your opinions. Thanks.
 
It was that methodic and calculated erosion of banking rules and regulations that did it. I blame the republicans for letting their rich buddies get away with it. I blame the democrats for not calling them on the carpet for it.

To sell us on the erosion of banking rules, it was hammered into us that the free-market is self correcting. The split second that rhetoric fell apart, Bush put Wall Street on the taxpayers teat. Give my aching hide a break.
 
From the viewpoint of every other major economy...the U.S. would be the blame. This crisis is not a foreign one...its a domestic one that went international. Within the states...companies that are highly mismanaged, loosely watched, too much unregulated by the government (watchdogs)...led by greedy capitalist elites. Republicans and Democrats...how you say...nowadays, not much seperating the two parties behind the curtain. Politics in the U.S. of A. is tightly controlled by politcal dynasty bloodlines and wealthy investors of these dynasties with the same view on politics.
 
i am a libertarian and all the chit hit the fan when the democratic congress was voted into office in 2006.. the recession officially started 11 months later and here we are .. everyone like to blame the bush administration and they forget that obama was part of that class of senators..anybody who can claim otherwise is just denying the facts .. that when you have a change like that and a reaction like that ,they are normally connected together
 
The short term view, conveniently held by politicians, holds that the under-regulated derivatives market allowed the free market to give loans to those who could not afford them because greedy bankers tried to make as much money as possible before the house of cards fell. This ignores the last 100 years of financial market regulation progressively eliminating free market competition and the fact that absent government efforts to expand lending, banks would not have made the large numbers of risky loans that were packaged into the derivatives.

The long term view holds that government intervention through the Federal Reserve, Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac, the Community Reinvestment Act and subsequent legislation led to artificially low interest rates and illogical, qualitative lending standards based on political objectives supplanting logical, quantitative lending standards based on ability to pay the loan back.

In the thousands of years of lending that preceded the current debacle, banks did not willingly lend money to obvious credit risks because they knew it would lead to a breakdown of the system. Not until the government decided that lending should be made based on their own political objectives did this perfect storm develop.

The federal government used Fannie Mae (established in 1930s) and Freddie Mac (established in 1960s) as a clearing house for mortgages so that banks can quickly sell new loans to make more loans.

The federal government used the Community Reinvestment Act (1977) and other legislation since 1997 to force banks to lend to people who had no ability to pay the loans back. When banks remained reluctant to make risky loans, the government allowed investment banks to merge with regular banks to make the traditional banks more open to risk.

The Federal Reserve Bank (established 1913) kept rates artificially low during the early 2000s. This made payments on adjustable rate mortgages appear manageable. Mortgages traditionally reserved for short term investors and flippers were given to people who literally could only afford the current interest payment.

The existence of these government interventions is the root of the problem; however, they only purpose regulations that expand their authority rather than eliminating the causes of the problem. Then they have the nerve to blame the private sector for operating under the conditions dictated by the government. The exchange markets operated for 1000s of years without this type of problem. The government gets heavily involved for 100 years and look what happens.

I tend to identify with Libertarians politically.
 
I'm sure the housing portion of the crisis had nothing to do with Bush's "ownership society":

"In a bid to boost minority homeownership, President Bush will ask Congress for authority to eliminate the down-payment requirement for Federal Housing Administration loans." 1/20/2004
 
The housing crisis, which was caused by liberals attempting to make every poor person and minority a home owner, whether they could afford to be one or not. God bless.
 
Government as a whole and greedy people who wanted their giant houses that they should've researched to see that they couldn't afford.

Big blame for me goes to Barney Frank and Freddie/Fannie.

In 2005 John McCain tried to regulate them with a Housing Act. Barney said that there was NO REASON to do that and it would ONLY hurt the poor. "F&F were just fine!" The bill didn't pass because of greedy Democrats AND Republicans who were lining their pockets with dirty money from these 2.



Oh and I'm a Republican.
 
The same idiots who were in economic control last year are still there, they have gone from being idiots under Bush to geniuses under Obama according to most of the news media. The mortgage crisis, which was peddled around teh world and suckered them all in too, began over ten years ago when then HUD secretary under Clinton, Andrew Coumo, changed a policy without Congressional review to allow good debts to be repackaged with bad debts and sold on teh international market like a commodity. Basciaclly this was a vote buying operation, giving houses to people who couldn't qualify for a mortgage, because they couldn't afford it. They were all in on it in the Clinton administration, most of whom are back there now, and Congress, outside of people like Ron Paul, didn't dare challenge it. Barney Frank and Chris Dood are two of the biggest culprits, and tehy are still in charge, protecting Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac from any useful reform, and in fact while stoking flames of outrage over AIG bonuses, slipped in bonuses for Freddie and Fannie execs too. Again, teh crooks responsible are all still there. The inexcusable spike in energy prices, at the same time democrats refuse to allow drilling here at home, even if it means our troops die overseas securing supplie sthere, played a role, enough of one the democrats were able to run around the last two years screaming the economy was horrible, driving down the pysche of Wall St. Now, magically, with a democrat in the White House everything is supposed to turn around, even though all the same people and factors are still in place, they are issuing trillions more in debts, printing more money, we still have an energy crisis, increasing unemployment, a war overseas, increasing taxes at every level of government, AND we still have not addressed what happens when the baby boomers start reaching for their pension funds, that DO NOT EXIST. More people than ever didn't pay taxes on the 15th, filed for extensions, or had to borrow money to pay their taxes, and we have not dealt with the credit card debt. Everyone expects to be bailed out, and why not? One more can't hurt? It's like sitting on a roof in New Orleans expecting President Bush to send you your very own personal helicopter to rescue you.
 
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