re: #396 austin_blue

Everyone was to blame. The Dems didn’t *force* the banks to make subprime loans. Many didn’t. What happened was the Wall Street Playaz repackaged the subprimes that were generated as financial instruments that were purchased by others that were betting that home prices would increase. When the crash inevitably came, people were holding (and still are) paper that that has an indefinite value, but is still on their books. Asset? Poison? Until the shakeout settles down, nobody has any idea what those instruments are worth. And the Dems most definitely did *not* invent those instruments.

But they were sued into making subprime loans (a la citibank). No, the Dems didn’t invent the instruments, but they made quotas for subprime loans. The mortgage backed securities was the method banks developed to unload the loans they didn’t want to make. Once they realized they could make beaucoup bucks doing that, they were off to the races.