LOL - the western world is consumer driven - govt's jst fine tune taxes and make sure the growth rate on births and deaths are okay so you cant blame govt's ( as your the ones voting them in ) As for banking CEO's - most of them dont run companies, they also just fine tune. Its down to mid US trailer homes and ppl over stretching themselves......greed greed greed. And you do vote them in! Whatever party you vote in, the government still get in
Mia: If you look at the references and articles from the Wiki piece, you will see explicitly that every reference that blames CRA is opinion without fact. Nowhere within those pieces do they show that there was an explosion of CRA loans that specifically created the financial mess we now have. Alternatively you look at some of the pieces that dispute the attack on CRA and some of those include specific numbers and studies that thoroughly negate the argument. One study points to a huge increase in 2nd mortgages and 100% or more LTV loans occurring over the last few years. The problem loans specifically don't meet CRA guidelines. Finally those that argue against it point to the Bush policies, different from CRA that encouraged loans that became problems. In the midst of the biggest financial crisis since the great depression there was a huge variety of mounting issues that caused this debacle. It was a runup in lending that covered a lot of territory and points to a lot of excesses. You actually speak to some of them in some of your various posts. Regardless simply establishing blame and starting it out by labeling problems as Carter/Clinton caused immediately takes one to some old fashioned partisan attack. What a waste of time. All that energy focused on partisan attacks. A new president is going to have to go in and attack these problems. He'll need the best data available. The last thing he needs are wild @ssed opinions steeped in partisanship that don't reflect reality. It does appear that CRA loans increased during the problem period. It also appears that as these increased, alternative loans that were subprime, undocumented, that supported 100% and higher LTV, increased at far far higher rates and these were the root causes of this crisis on the lending side.
Who was taking bigger checks from Fannie and Friddie? Dems or Republicans? Did you ever take a look at the group ACORN (who right now is under voter fraud investigation)? Under the leadership of Barack Obama they tried to get thousands of people qualified for loans that they could not pay for. And yet Obama and Palosi blame Bush. The house is more responsible for economic affairs than the commander in chief. And as proven before, Bush called for monitoring of Fannie and Friddie on four specific occasions during the past 7 years. Yet no one (including Barney) listened. Instead they tried to shoot it down.
First off, I don't give Obama BinLaden (sorry I ment Barack Obama) any credit...let alone his "leadership" skills. The fact is, the House and the Senate are made up of BOTH parties, majority or not. They all have their own agenda...depending on the day of the week. There is a MAJOR gap between the "people" whom they are supposed to "work for" and the "people" who "govern" who have their own concerns to meet "their needs" and "their own situations". Is it an easy fix?..NO, but if the "government" could remember "who" put them into office to "do a job" that they "promised" to do in the first place, maybe things would run a little smoother. I certainly know, YOU CAN'T PLEASE EVERYONE, But the majority who put them in office would be nice. Sorry for all of the quotes...just proving a point.