Can we not agree that they did nothing...for a reason?
I'd contend that the plug could've been pulled on Fannie and Freddie at almost anytime during 2008. Instead, they timed the crisis for mid-September so as to achieve maximum electoral impact.
Chuckie Schumer even set the stage in August, when he went public with the impending failure of IndyMac -- a bank the FDIC was discretely trying to place in stronger hands.
One might say the Democrats intentionally destroyed the economy, so they could win an election and pick up the pieces.
2008?
The market started collapsing around Sept 2007 a year before that that final big TARP panic. By 2007 (really late 2005) house prices had been run up to completely unsustainable prices and a collapse was coming.
Any action to curb loaning by then just would have brought it on sooner not later. It was the Fed raising interest rates that did that.
The new Democrat House worked with Bush to pass ‘stimulus #1’ and a ban on light bulbs, they did something.
Heres what I got on this thread to describe Bush presidency:
1) ‘It was Roves fault’
2) ‘It was GOP in congress fault’
3) ‘It was Democrats fault’
4) ‘Whose side are you on anyway??’
(similar to ‘You are EITHER with US or you are with the terrorists’)
How about 'The Dems forced Bush to call for TARP' as #5??
This is not a legacy, it is a disaster.