Occupy Wall Street

[Xiahou]

It's the golden rule: him with the gold makes the rules. A politician usually does what s/he's paid to do. I think it's more accurate and useful to examine the role of the paymaster than the employee.

So instead of reforming the government that paid bailouts, you think it'd be easier to reform.... human nature?

Edit: Also, don't kid yourself. Fannie and Freddie were very much in the thick of the mortgage crisis.

The GSEs did generate large losses, but their bad investments in housing loans followed rather than led the crisis; most of those investments involved purchases or guarantees made well after the subprime and housing bubbles had been expanded by private loans and were almost about to burst.

Their buying mortgage backed securities funneled more money back to the investment banks which allowed them to make even more loans.