"with reckless abandon". I see reading comprehension isn't your strong suit. If you didn't get it and you obviously didn't, I will explain it for you. I was implying that this practice has greatly increased in the last 8 years. If it increased that implies it existed previously.
I find it pretty interesting that everyone blames the politicians and banks, but not you don't often hear people blaming the US consumers that have overspend on credit and took out mortgages they could never have afforded.
So if banks were still leveraged at 15:1 like the rules said when Clinton was in power you still think the 5% of defaulting loans would have caused this mess? So if the SEC hadn't made this market into a turkey shoot for short sellers and allowed a totally unregulated and naked derivatives market to exist you think we'd would still have had all those bank failures? So Cwhen Clinton was in power he added to the low income lending stuff that was started back in 1978. Clinton didn't force Greenspan to cut interest rates to ridiculous levels. Clinton didn't fly airplanes into the towers in NYC. Clinton didn't force banks to abuse the lending rules. Clinton didn't repeal the uptick rule Clinton didn't support the un-regulated derivatives market Clinton didn't make corrupt bond and credit rating agencies give AAA ratings to shit bags of CDOs Clinton didn't repeal the rules that forced banks to stay under 15:1 leverage. How is this Clintons fault?
At first things didn't suck. Then things started to suck more and more. Now things really suck. Hope that helps.
They should be blamed too, but I think most of them are paying a price. Hopefully, we will correct that behavior.
Don't forget the Weapon of Mass Financial Destruction - CDS. To me. this allow unlimited leverage ratio and that seal the deal for this kind of outcome.
The average American sits on their hands with their thumbs up their butts and allows the politicians to run amoke with all of our hard earned money and then when then whole mess comes crumbling down around our ears we wake up . . . amazing. The consumers think the free money train will never end so they credit themselves to death and then whine about the mess THEY got themselves into. The ONLY way this problem is EVER going to get solved is if WE Americans, AS A WHOLE, begin to really CARE and decide to VOTE all of the incumbent, graft sucking, PAC pandering dogs out of office and replace them with individuals that are GREAT MANAGERS with no political ties and have some BALLS (or guts depending on their gender). Pork Barrel spending should be illegal and punishable by mandatory jail time for anyone even suggesting it in a bill. The IRS needs abolished and replaced with a US Tax Collection Agency to handle the 13% flat tax we should legislate. Then WE need to make sure the average person is educated to NEVER again to commit financial suicide. You're not going to get anything new with either Obama or McCain so don't even HOPE you will. Oh by the way . . , Clinton was just as guilty as both Bush's, the only thing Clinton had in his favor was that he had a higher I.Q. . . . a lot of good that got us, huh.