Mario, Although the schemes you state were indeed initiated by the Democrats, it is the Republicans under Bush who took it to the next level and then took credit for the phony boom that ensued. The largest (and mostly unsustainable) increase in home ownership in American history occurred during Bush's term. In the video below, we see Bush promoting home ownership and bragging about the half trillion in increased lending to minorities and a reduction of restrictions and controls for home ownership.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kNqQx7sjoS8 Secondly, the two countries that have been the most badly affected by the banking crisis are the US and England. Losses amongst the US banks are estimated to be in the 1 -3 Trillion range. The losses in the non-UK European banks are in the hundreds of billions of dollars and most of them are because of losses from their subsidiaries operating in the UK and the US. As always, Mario's retreat to partisan thinking dooms his ability to make the right conclusions. Marlon --- On Mon, 2/16/09, Mario Goveia <mgov...@sbcglobal.net> wrote: Mario observes: If what you see today is what you get for un-regulated markets, how does one explain why the financial situation is even worse in the highly regulated markets in western Europe, and why the most regulated markets of all, in the socialist basket cases, are in the worst shape of all? The seeds of the current financial crisis in the US were sown by liberal government regulations forcing the banking system to lower lending standards to encourage low income people to buy their houses, starting with the Community Reinvestment Act under Jimmy Carter, later expanded by Bill Clinton and most recently defended and protected by Barack Obama and other Democrat politicians, who were heavily compensated for their efforts by massive political contributions from the PACs of Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac, whose managers and employees benefited from huge bonuses from the increased lending that took place from this. The big banks also joined in, encouraged by the delusion of growth and the bonuses generated. As with every socialist house of cards everything eventually came tumbling down because what was going on was fundamentally flawed based on basic economic principles.
