Free Republic

Geithner: Dodd-Frank critics are toying with another financial meltdownBy Peter Schroeder - 02/02/12 04:55 PM ET Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner swung back at critics of the Dodd-Frank financial reform law Thursday, arguing that those detractors are pushing for a repeat of the financial crisis. Both in Congress and on the campaign trail, the Obama administration's reforms have come under fire. Lawmakers are pushing several bills that would repeal portions of the law, and every major Republican candidate has vowed to kill it as one of their first acts in office. But Geithner said such a rollback would merely make the...

Maybe you're sick to death of all the to-do over SOPA (the Stop Online Piracy Act and its Senate buddy the Protect Intellectual Property Act or PIPA) or you just really needed your Wikipedia fix today (don't worry, you can still read their SOPA page!). But really, isn't it awesome that people won't shut up about something actually important for once? Reason didn't participate, but don't take that as any sort of endorsement of nosy government activities. Nick Gillespie reported earlier today on the protest and how it has drawn support from all sides of the political spectrum. What's interesting...

Consumer group Public Knowledge on Friday accused the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) and its head, former Sen. Chris Dodd, of trying to intimidate lawmakers into supporting a pair of controversial anti-piracy bills. In recent days, Dodd and other top Hollywood figures have threatened to cut off campaign donations to politicians who do not support their effort to crackdown on online copyright infringement. "Those who count on quote 'Hollywood' for support need to understand that this industry is watching very carefully who's going to stand up for them when their job is at stake. Don't ask me to write...

from the sickening dept Reinforcing the fact that Chris Dodd really does not get what's happening, and showing just how disgustingly corrupt the MPAA relationship is with politicians, Chris Dodd went on Fox News to explicitly threaten politicians who accept MPAA campaign donations that they'd better pass Hollywood's favorite legislation... or else: "Those who count on quote 'Hollywood' for support need to understand that this industry is watching very carefully who's going to stand up for them when their job is at stake. Don't ask me to write a check for you when you think your job is at risk...

The Google logo has been blacked out today. Wikipedia, reddit, Mozilla and Twitpic are all blocking access to content. Even Star Trek icon George Takei has blocked his site. The moves are displays of cyber-protest against the heavy-handed and ill-conceived Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA). From a political and public relations standpoint, this has already been a complete and utter failure for Hollywood and their formerly formidable lobbying arm, the Motion Picture Association of America. Former Sen. Chris Dodd became the new CEO of the MPAA after he realized he would never be re-elected in his home state of Connecticut...

Former Fannie Mae executive Ed Pinto, who worked at the mortgage giant before it began buying up risky mortgages, has also described Fannie Mae’s key role in buying up and promoting risky sub-prime mortgages, which Fannie Mae did on a large scale, despite having a capital cushion that was tiny compared to private banks, resulting in its later insolvency and massive taxpayer bailout. A recent book about the causes of the crisis by New York Times business reporter Gretchen Morgenson and financial analyst Josh Rosner, “Reckless Endangerment,” chronicles how “it was Fannie Mae and the government housing policies it supported,...

The untold story of the Obama Administration’s widely reported, $335 million discrimination settlement with Countrywide Financial Corporation is that, under a secret Justice Department program, a chunk of the money won’t go to the “victims” but rather leftist groups not connected to the lawsuit. The Department of Justice (DOJ) will determine which “qualified organizations” get leftover settlement cash and Democrat-tied groups like the scandal-plagued Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) and the open-borders National Council of La Raza (NCLR) stand to get large sums based on the

It was recently observed that Ron Paul was to the left of Obama on national security and the best evidence for that statement can be found when one year ago Ron Paul joined forces with Barney Frank​ on a proposal to gut national defense via a panel of experts, quite a few of whom were tied to George Soros​. In July 2010, Barney Frank and Ron Paul co-authored a Huffington Post article rolling out their Sustainable Defense Task Force. The Task Force “consisting of experts on military expenditures that span the ideological spectrum” would recommend a trillion dollars in defense...

California Atty. Gen. Kamala D. Harris is suing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to force the mortgage giants to answer questions about their role in California's housing meltdown. In two suits filed Tuesday in San Francisco County Superior Court, Harris seeks to compel the companies to respond to subpoenas from her office that have been ignored so far. Harris is seeking information about the practices by Fannie and Freddie in California as part of her ongoing investigation into the mortgage industry. The suits ask a judge to order the two companies to answer a set of 51 questions served in...

"Barney Frank: I've destroyed the economy, my work here is done." — Washington Times headline, Nov. 29 It was quite a confluence of news last week when in the span of hours came Rep. Frank's retirement announcement, a report on declining housing prices and home-ownership rates, and a poll belaboring the obvious about Americans' fears about the housing and stock markets. With his fellow Democrat, former Sen. Chris Dodd of Connecticut, Rep. Frank, D-Mass., shoulders much of the blame for today's economic catastrophe and the fiscal crises plaguing governments at all levels. They spent years pushing policies that ultimately required...

Gingrich on Inauguration Day: Repeal Obamacare, Sarbanes-Oxley, Dodd-FrankBy Mallie Jane Kim December 7, 2011 If former House Speaker Newt Gingrich is elected president, he has a busy first day planned. At his speech at the Republican Jewish Coalition's 2012 Republican Presidential Candidates Forum this afternoon, Gingrich urged attendees to help vote a large Republican majority into the House and Senate in 2012 so Congress could immediately pass repeals of the Affordable Care Act and the financial regulations Sarbanes-Oxley and Dodd-Frank. They should do so early in January, "before I am sworn in," he said. "Bring it out during the inaugural...

In January of 2010, then-Senators Christopher Dodd (D-Connecticut) and Byron Dorgan (D-North Dakota) announced they would not be seeking re-election that year. The New York Times reported on the sudden retirements saying they "signaled that President Obama is facing a perilous political environment that could hold major implications for this year's midterm elections and his own agenda." We now refer to those major implications as what Mr. Obama himself called the "shellacking" of his party in those elections. Does today's announcement that 16-term Congressman Barney Frank (D-Massachusetts) will not seek re-election send a similar signal about 2012?

Even as Bank of America and other major lenders back away from charging customers to use their debit cards, many banks have been quietly imposing other new fees. Need to replace a lost debit card? Bank of America now charges $5 — or $20 for rush delivery. Deposit money with a mobile phone? At U.S. Bancorp, it is now 50 cents a check. Want cash wired to your account? Starting in December, that will cost $15 for each incoming domestic payment at TD Bank. Facing a reaction from an angry public and heightened scrutiny from regulators, banks are turning to...

Can we really trust her on this? It sounds … so unlike him. In a week filled with accusations about skeevy behavior by politicians around women, it’s only right that we pay tribute to the master. “So, [in 1985,] having recently graduated completely healed and normal from my first stint in a rehab, and appearing in an almost perfectly respectable piece of work, I found myself driving from Baltimore to Washington, D.C., to have dinner with Chris Dodd, this senator who I knew virtually nothing about. Nor did Senator Dodd — like most people, then, now and always — have...

President Barack Obama may be smarting because his sweeping jobs bill has mostly stalled in Congress, but the Dodd-Frank bill—much maligned as a job killer—could boost the kind of work Democrats find hard to tout. The Dodd-Frank financial reform overhaul last year aimed to curb the excessive Wall Street risk-taking that nearly leveled the financial system. It subjected the $600 trillion global derivatives market to regulation, increased banking oversight and created a new consumer protection bureau, among other measures. And a debate has raged ever since over the impact of Dodd-Frank, with Republicans asserting the costs and uncertainty created by...

There is currently $600 trillion in derivative positions on a global economy of $60 trillion. Not a problem eh? The “cause” is the BANKS lootin and pillaging.­They deliberate­ly helped Greece hide its debt. The “problem ” was the US allowed the banks to defraud the western world. Finance Superstars Talk About the Massive Fraud in Our Economic System Nobel Prize-winn­ing economist Joe Stiglitz stated how reducing transparen­cy and hiding informatio­n was an essential element to the crisis. Stiglitz concluded, “Innovatio­n was regulator and tax arbitrage Wall Street and the banks deliberate­ly added opacity and complexity to confuse clients and consumers....

Senator Chris Dodd has a problem with all these over the counter contracts that trade around the globe without a central clearing place. He would love to see that all contractual transactions have a central clearing house. It protects the counter-party, right?So, the Chicago Mercantile Exchange is in the business of clearing futures transaction. They would be a great fit for clearing OTC [over the counter] transactions. It would be good for the counter-parties, it would be good for the CME [Chicago Mercantile Exchange]. Oh, and it would be good for the people that sit on the Board of Directors....

In today’s Wall Street Journal: Asked who was to blame for the 2008 financial crisis and whether any bankers should have been prosecuted, Mrs. Bachmann and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich put the onus on the federal government, with Mr. Gingrich suggesting that former Senate Banking Chairman Chris Dodd and Rep. Barney Frank, former chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, should both be jailed.“It was the federal government that pushed the subprime loans . . . that pushed the community reinvestment act,� said Mrs. Bachmann, citing what she considered the causes of the housing meltdown.Mr. Frank released an emailed...

Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich got worked up when asked about the Occupy Wall Street protests at last night's Bloomberg-Washington Post debate. Gingrich first sought to tie the protests to "left-wing agitators" before calling for the firing of Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner. He then doubled down, calling on former Sen. Chris Dodd and Rep. Barney Frank to be thrown in jail, not anyone on Wall Street. Asked if he actually meant for them to do prison time, Gingrich said he did, alluding to past ethical scandals. Watch the video below: CLICK ABOVE LINK...

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- The fees keep coming. Citi is the latest big bank to slap customers with a round of fee hikes. This time, on its checking accounts. Starting in December, customers who hold its mid-level Citibank Account will be charged $20 a month if they fail to maintain a minimum balance of $15,000 in their combined accounts. Previously, account holders had to carry a minimum balance of $6,000. At the same time, customers who have the bank's EZ Checking account will start being charged $15 a month if they don't carry a minimum balance of $6,000. Citi says...

Hold on to your wallet: The Durbin Amendment goes into effect Saturday. The once-obscure amendment to the Dodd-Frank financial-reform bill limits “interchange fees,” which banks charge to merchants for providing the service that allows stores to accept debit-card payments. The fees were cut by some 80 percent, which makes it less profitable for banks to offer debit-card services. So the banks have done the natural thing and begun to transfer the fee from merchants to their customers, with Bank of America announcing a new $5-per-month fee for debit-card users. Naturally, the amendment’s author, Sen. Dick Durbin (D., Ill.) is in...

Government imposes new price controls on an industry. Industry raises prices elsewhere to make up for the artificial cap on cost recovery. Government expresses shock, shock at the development. For those of us old enough to remember the 1970s, this seems like deja vu all over again, as Yogi Berra once said. For those either too young or too “dim,” as the Washington Examiner puts it, the surprise should be a learning experience, even for a “dim bulb” like Dick Durbin During the debate over the Dodd-Frank financial reform bill, when Democrats controlled Congress, Durbin insisted on including an amendment...

As I detailed here in February in "Dick Durbin Is Stealing Your Free Checking," thanks to price controls on debit card transactions from the Durbin Amendment of the 2010 Dodd-Frank "financial reform" law, free checking is going the way of the dodo bird. The Durbin price controls on interchange fees -- the so-called "swipe fees" that retailers pay to bank and credit unions that process debit card transactions, go into effect this Saturday, October 1, and are already showing more dire effects than originally predicted. Not only is free checking disappearing at a rapid pace -- a new Bankrate.com survey...

“Call it Dodd-Frank Inc. A year after Congress passed the broadest financial overhaul since the Great Depression, the law has spawned a host of new businesses to help Wall Street comply — and capitalize — on the hundreds of new regulations. Besides the lawyers, there are legions of corporate accountants, financial consultants, risk management advisers, turnaround artists and technology vendors all vying for their cut.” “It is a full-employment act,” said Gregory J. Lyons, a partner at Debevoise, where a team of a half-dozen lawyers has drafted 30-plus comment letters in the last six months. “The law is passed, but...

The Dodd-Frank Act goes on for 2,319 pages. Like Nancy Pelosi's "pass it to find out what's in the O'care Bill" statement, Senator Dodd said, "No one will know until this is actually in place how it works. But we believe we've done something that has been needed for a long time. It took a crisis to bring us to the point where we could actually get this job done." The Wall Street Journal reported on July 14, 2010, just one week before Obama signed Dodd-Frank into law that it will "unleash the biggest wave of new federal financial rule-making...

The amount billed by Debevoise & Plimpton to write a 17-page letter on a new rule intended to rein in risky banking — around $100,000 — would make most authors jealous. That’s the fee just for parsing the proper definition of a bank-owned hedge fund. Longer and more complex regulatory missives, weighing in on who should be deemed too big to fail or how derivatives are traded, can easily cost twice as much. These comment letters could save Wall Street banks billions of dollars if they help persuade policy makers to adopt a more lenient interpretation of the coming rules....

The lawsuits against Bank of America are piling up. The latest comes from Minneapolis-based U.S. Bancorp, which wants Bank of America Corp. to repurchase poorly-written mortgages sold by Countrywide Financial in 2005. Bank of America bought Countrywide Financial Corp. in 2008. The lawsuit, which was filed in New York on Monday, claims Countrywide sold U.S. Bancorp a pool of over 4,000 loans originally valued at $1.75 billion. U.S. Bancorp claims Countrywide ignored its own mortgage underwriting guidelines when issuing those loans. According to the complaint, Countrywide agreed to repurchase loans within 90 days if any of the statements made in...

The Federal Reserve Board on Tuesday requested public comment on a proposed rule under Regulation Z that would require creditors to determine a consumer's ability to repay a mortgage before making the loan and would establish minimum mortgage underwriting standards. The revisions to the regulation, which implements the Truth in Lending Act (TILA), are being made pursuant to the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. The proposal would apply to ALL CONSUMER MORTGAGES(except home equity lines of credit, timeshare plans, reverse mortgages, or temporary loans).

Barack Obama Has Destroyed the Economy in Two-and-a-Half Years July 14, 2011 BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: "Boehner: Dealing With the White House 'Has Been Like Dealing With Jell-O' -- In a meeting with a small group of reporters in his Capitol Hill office this morning [he] criticized President Obama and White House officials for their lack of resolve in negotiations. 'Dealing with them the last couple months has been like dealing with Jell-o,' Boehner said. 'Some days it's firmer than others. Sometimes it's like they've left it out over night.' Boehner explained that talks broke down over the weekend because,...

The idea of such a bank has been around since the 1990s but has never gained significant attention until now. In March a bipartisan bill was introduced in the Senate that gained the support of the US Chamber of Commerce, America’s leading business lobby, and the AFL-CIO, the country’s largest labor federation — two groups on opposite sides of most debates. The BUILD Act, proposed by Sens. John Kerry, D-Mass., Kay Hutchinson, R-Texas, and Mark Warner, D-Va., would create a national infrastructure bank that would provide loans and loan guarantees to encourage private investment in upgrading America’s infrastructure. There are...

New York soon will no longer be the financial capital of the world thanks to a hostile government that has served up a menu of punitive regulations aimed at driving big banks out of the country, says analyst Dick Bove. In his latest broadside against the post-crisis regulatory environment, Bove asserts that a recent spate of layoffs, particularly by Goldman Sachs, is just the latest sign that large financial institutions will have to take their operations overseas. The result, he says, will not be good both for New York and the nation. ... In the current climate, Bove says the...

Why is Goldman Sachs pre paring to outsource traders, salespeople and investment bankers from here in America, where it has made untold billions over the years as Wall Street's premier trading firm, to places like Singapore and India? The answer can be found largely in the 2,000-plus pages of last year's Dodd-Frank financial "reform" law -- which will eventually translate into some 40,000 pages of regulations. The financial industry is still frozen, waiting to find out how bad these regs will turn out; but what all the CEOs of the big banks know for sure is that it's about to...

Debit cards, a gleam in bankers' eyes 30 years ago, have become the preferred method for people to tap their bank accounts, a free and easy alternative to paper checks, live tellers or cash machines. U.S. shoppers used them 37 billion times last year, making them more popular than credit cards (19 billion transactions) and checks (18 billion), according to the payments newsletter Nilson Report. Another estimate puts the figure at 45 billion debits. But big changes are afoot that could make it much more expensive for consumers to use the cards. And with concern rising over data breaches, some...

For all those who believed that it was only JP Morgan who is manipulating the Brent-WTI spread, we regretfully have to inform you that the squid is once again front and center, having now been caught red-handed by none other than the ICE exchange, aka the home of Brent trading. From a just disclosed complaint: "On 28 January 2011 the Exchange’s monitoring detected six notable “price spikes” in the April11 Brent/WTI spread, between 14:26 hours and 14:31 hours UK time. These were investigated and found to be the result of a limit order and several large market orders placed in...

Report: "Reckless Endangerment"June 10, 2011 BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: Last night I promised that I would begin reading on my own a book, and I did: "Reckless Endangerment: How Outsized Ambition, Greed, and Corruption Led to Economic Armageddon." It's by Gretchen Morgenson and Joshua Rosner (he might pronounce it Rose-ner), and Gretchen is a business writer for the New York Times. I have to confess, before I knew anything of the book or knew anything of the contents of the book, simply because she was at the New York Times I figured it was going to have an obviously left-wing slant...

Senate panel discusses state of small banks. * Smaller banks post lower earnings compared to big rivals. Community bankers on Wednesday pressed lawmakers to make sure the new Wall Street financial reform law does not inadvertently crush their businesses. Small-bank representatives said last year's Dodd-Frank reform law does not do enough to spare them from costly regulations or level the playing field with banking behemoths such as Bank of America (BAC.N) and JPMorgan Chase (JPM.N). "The cumulative burden of hundreds of new or revised regulations may be a weight too great for many smaller banks to bear," Tommy Whittaker, president...

The Dodd Frank Act does not boast many friends in the financial industry. It does not take much asking around to find a banker who believes that its architects – senators Chris Dodd and Barney Frank – have contributed to many firms’ marked difficulties in reaching return on equity targets. three critical problems with the legislation: artificial deadlines, the rule-making process, and, above all, the ongoing budget stalemate in the US. Although the act contains over 2,000 pages, it is, in many ways, more remarkable for what did not make it into the text. Rather than lay down prescriptions for...

WASHINGTON (AFP) – The Senate will soon issue findings of a probe of the US mortgage meltdown that fueled the global financial crisis, with Goldman Sachs likely to face fresh embarrassment over its role, the Wall Street Journal reported Sunday. The Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, whose high-profile inquiry commission subpoenaed Goldman's and other executives last year, is due to release its report on the subprime implosion of 2007 and 2008. The paper, citing people familiar with the matter, said the report was expected to release emails from securities firms that developed or sold subprime mortgages and financial vehicles including...

Former Connecticut Sen. Chris Dodd, a veteran Washington insider, is Hollywood's new chief lobbyist. The Motion Picture Assn. of America said Tuesday that Dodd will become the new chief executive of the MPAA, the lobbying arm for the main studios that also oversees the film ratings system. Dodd succeeds Dan Glickman, a former Kansas congressman and Secretary of Agriculture, who stepped down a year ago after five years on the job. Dodd will pull down more than $1.5 million in salary, 25% greater than the $1.2 million Glickman received.

Angelo Mozilo, former boss of Countrywide Financial, has been charged with civil fraud and insider trading by the Securities and Exchange Commission. He is the highest profile executive to face charges relating to the US sub-prime mortgage crisis in 2007. --snip-- Mr Mozilo has denied doing anything wrong. Two other former executives have also been charged with civil fraud. --snip -- The SEC published extracts from e-mails sent by Mr Mozilo. "The bottom line is that we are flying blind on how these loans will perform in a stressed environment of higher unemployment, reduced values and slowing home sales," he...

The Securites Exchange Commission (SEC) formally charged former Countrywide Financial CEO Angelo Mozilo and two other company executives with civil fraud. The SEC also charged Mozilo with illegal insider trading, an agency spokesman said Thursday. Civil fraud charges also were filed against Countrywide's former Chief Operating Officer David Sambol and ex-Chief Financial Officer Eric Sieracki. Countrywide Financial, the California-based mortgage lender, was a key component to the subprime mortgage crisis in 2007, which was the beginning of the financial decline and current recession in the U.S. Mozilo is the most high-profile individual to face formal charges from the federal government...

House Democrats Lock GOP Out of Committee Room A bitter divide over Countrywide mortgage scandal. By JAMES FREEMAN Democratic staff for the House oversight committee informed their GOP counterparts today that the majority has changed the locks on the committee's hearing room. While Republicans previously enjoyed their own key to the room, they will now have to request access from Democrats. This followed a bitter partisan argument in which Republicans refused to take down a video from their website that contradicted Dem explanations about a closed-door meeting on the Countrywide VIP loan scandal. As we reported last week, the committee...

U.S. drops criminal probe of former Countrywide chief Angelo MoziloBy E. Scott Reckard, Los Angeles Times February 18, 2011, 4:11 p.m. Federal prosecutors have shelved a criminal investigation of Angelo R. Mozilo after determining that his actions in the mortgage meltdown — which led to $67.5-million settlement against him — did not amount to criminal wrongdoing. As the former chairman of Countrywide Financial Corp., Mozilo helped fuel the boom in risky subprime loans that led to the crippling of the banking industry and the near-collapse of the financial system. A federal grand jury in Los Angeles began probing Mozilo in...

Issa demands details on Countrywide's VIP loan programBy Peter Schroeder - 02/16/11 06:31 PM ET Bank of America will have to turn over all documents and records tied to Countrywide Financial's VIP lending program after House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) issued a subpoena for them Wednesday. Issa announced the far-reaching subpoena, his first as chairman of the panel, and made clear that he wanted to know specifically what public employees or elected officials may have benefited from the program. Issa is looking for all documents about the program, and is particularly interested in what "covered borrowers" were involved...

The report delivered Friday by Geithner and Housing and Urban Development Secretary Shaun Donovan presents three approaches for a future housing finance system. It also calls the government to shrink “and ultimately wind down” Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the bailed-out government-sponsored enterprise companies that helped fuel the housing bubble before being felled by investments in subprime mortgages. “This is a plan for fundamental reform -- to wind down the GSEs, strengthen consumer protection and preserve access to affordable housing for people who need it,” Geithner said in a statement accompanying the report. The report also pledges ongoing U.S. government...

Fed Casts A Wide Net In Defining Systemic RiskBy ERIC DASH Published: February 8, 2011 Federal regulators on Tuesday took an expansive view of the types of companies that could be deemed essential enough to the financial system that they should be subjected to greater oversight. The Federal Reserve, in a 22-page proposal required by the Dodd-Frank financial legislation, outlined initial criteria for identifying ”systemically important financial institutions,” whose collapse would pose a serious threat to the economy. The Fed says at least 35 companies, all of them big banks, may pose systemic risks, but that number could grow to...

WASHINGTON — The 2008 financial crisis was an “avoidable” disaster caused by widespread failures in government regulation, corporate mismanagement and heedless risk-taking by Wall Street, according to the conclusions of a federal inquiry. The commission that investigated the crisis casts a wide net of blame, faulting two administrations, the Federal Reserve and other regulators for permitting a calamitous concoction: shoddy mortgage lending, the excessive packaging and sale of loans to investors and risky bets on securities backed by the loans... While the panel, the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, accuses several financial institutions of greed, ineptitude or both, some of its...

Full title..Fresh Group Of Life Insurance Companies Sue Countrywide Alleging "Massive Fraud" In Mortgage Security Sales Just another taste of the legal worries that will keep Brian Moynihan's lawyers busy putting out mortgage related fires. A group of life insurance companies has sued Countrywide alleging massive mortgage fraud. Here's the list of plaintiffs. Here's the intro of their complaint:

In the summer of 2008, Senate banking committee chief counsel Amy Friend helped bail out Bank of America and the rest of the mortgage industry. A couple months later, Friend helped craft the Great Wall Street Bailout. After that, she helped her boss, Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., pass a sweeping financial regulation bill. On Tuesday, Friend started her new job on K Street as managing director at Promontory Financial Group, the self-described "premier global financial services consulting firm," to work with clients on "the regulatory implementation of the Dodd-Frank," according to the firm's press release. It's an unseemly storyline, but...

Right up until that fateful week in September of 2008 when Lehman Brothers, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac,Merrill Lynch and AIG all imploded, most of the media, government and financial professionals either could not or would not acknowledge the economic disaster that was unfolding before their eyes. Of course now that the horse has escaped these same visionaries have been eager to provide their expertise in locksmithing so as to determine how best to close the barn door. A casual stroll through your local book store leaves one practically assaulted from the sheer volume of explanations and witch hunts. The whole...