Oh my gosh… there’s a journalist who actually has a clue. According to Sebastian Mallaby1:
The claim that the financial crisis reflects Bush-McCain deregulation is not only nonsense. It is the sort of nonsense that could matter.
First, deregulation occurred in 19993 during the Clinton administration. Second, deregulation should have been a good thing. Third, deregulation and lack of oversight are not the same thing — legalizing hand guns does not give anyone the right to go out and murder someone. Fourth, every effort to exercise oversight over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac failed to gain traction in Congress.
There are a few people who should be charged with committing fraud: they knowingly lied when they said “there is no problem”. There are a few others who at least deserve to be fired because of their stupidity and greed. And there is a whole host of politicians who should be terribly ashamed for not having the guts to go against their party and scream and yell until somebody listened.
One of my favorite movies is “The American President”. When I think about this economic mess we’re in and the impact it’s having on the election, I can’t help but recall what Rothschild (Michael J. Fox) says to Shepherd (Michael Douglas) in light of Shepherd’s waning popularity:
People want leadership, Mr. President, and in the absence of genuine leadership, they’ll listen to anyone who steps up to the microphone. They want leadership. They’re so thirsty for it they’ll crawl through the desert toward a mirage, and when they discover there’s no water, they’ll drink the sand.2
My biggest fear is that November 4 is going to leave most of us with an unexpected thirst.
References:
1 http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/opinion/viewpoints/stories/DN-mallaby_08edi.State.Edition1.255f222.html
2 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0112346/quotes
3 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gramm-Leach-Bliley_Act