No one cog in the federal government's machine of financial regulation let down the country by failing to prevent the latest shakeout on Wall Street. The entire system did.
"They just haven't done a particularly good job," said James Barth, a senior finance fellow at the Milken Institute, a nonpartisan research group based in Los Angeles.
Kathleen Day, a spokeswoman for the Center for Responsible Lending, a consumer-oriented research group, explained the regulatory lapses more starkly: "The job of regulators is that when the party's in full swing, make sure the partygoers drink responsibly," she said. "Instead, they let everyone drink as much as they wanted and then handed them the car keys."
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1980: After interest rates rise 13 percentage points in 2 years, President Carter signs law further hollowing out Glass-Steagall. The measure—pushed through by Sen. Jake Garn (R-Utah), a former insurance executive—demolishes usury caps for mortgages and raises bar for prosecuting lenders.
Jan 1981: Sen. Garn becomes chair of Senate Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee with fellow deregulation advocate M. Danny Wall as majority staff director. American Banker exults that "lobbyists here view Mr. Wall's promotion as a gift swept to shore by the [gop] tide last election day."
1982: Sen. Garn coauthors Garn-St. Germain Depository Institutions Act, which deregulates savings and loan industry.
1984: S&Ls start crashing in Texas as oil boom peters out. More than 1,000 thrifts nationwide will fail between 1986 and 1995; debacle will cost $500 billion, including $124 billion in taxpayer money.
http://www.motherjones.com/news/feature/2008/07/where-credit-is-due-time...