the proliferation of "easy, no down payment" mortgages, inflated fees, no-confirmation applications, bundling high risk notes for investors schemes have all contributed, they are complex activities, lacking the 30 second sound bitedness of insider trading.

geez, i never thought i'd suggest insider trading was simple to understand, by comparison to other financial schemes! oh, what a strange world we live in.

a lot of "funny money" events have gone into creating the problems now erupting, like a pustule on the nation's skin. the bush administration has chosen to ignore them.

What we need to see from the candidates is a job creation plan that will allow people to earn more income.  Credit crisis is to follow housing crisis, which will be followed by restructuring and layoffs.  I remember arguing just a couple months back with someone on this very site.

Their argument that the economy is healthy seems rather ridiculous now. Perhaps there will be no recession, perhaps people will find bags of money under their porches and pay their credit down instead of buying more stuff that will end up in a landfill.

Noble aspiration, that, increasing home ownership among low-income families, but they created a monster.

From wiki:

Role of government and regulators

Some observers claim that government policy actually encouraged the development of the subprime debacle through legislation like the Community Reinvestment Act, which they say forces banks to lend to otherwise uncreditworthy consumers.[35] Economist Robert Kuttner has criticized the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act as contributing to the subprime meltdown. [36] A taxpayer funded government bailout related to mortgages during the Savings and Loan crisis may have created a moral hazard and acted as encouragement to lenders to make similar higher risk loans. [37]

In response to a concern that lending was not properly regulated, the House and Senate are both considering bills to regulate lending practices.[38]