The bailout and other efforts to save Wall Street firms and the large banks are essentially an effort to deal with the problems of derivatives and other market failures. Wall Street got the court decisions and legislation it wanted and then promptly proceeded to create today's disaster.
They sold these risky products and now they have to pay off. But they don't have the money even with the current bailouts. Where will they get it? The federal government was the only sucker left to tap and that bet came through to the tune of $4.6 trillion. There's $4.6 trillion awaiting further requests from the Federal Reserve
The culprits are still in place at failing financial institutions.
Don't hold your breath waiting for political action to fix the situation. Both parties were in on this mess. Huge majorities in both houses of Congress voted for key legislation to allow the biggest bank heist of all time. But his time, it was the banks pulling the heist.
That's why the bankers have to stay in place. To remove them, would be telling, as William K. Black said recently:
"But the other element of your question is we don't want to change the bankers, because if we do, if we put honest people in, who didn't cause the problem, their first job would be to find the scope of the problem. And that would destroy the cover up."
William K. Black, Apr. 3, 2009
But it was all legal, wasn't it?
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