Biggest Villains Of The Financial Crisis (POLL)

As we all know by now, the financial crisis was caused by a series of systematic failures -- botched regulations, corporations that grew to be too big too fail, consumer greed and, of course, outright fraud. Throughout the crisis, though, some names stick out more than others.

We decided to assemble a motley crue of financial insiders who've done more than their fair share to cause our current economic crisis.

Who's the biggest villain? Who's more of an innocent bystander? VOTE below:

Now Make Your Own Top 5 And Share with Your Friends

Allen Stanford, Stanford Financial Group

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Vote and Share Choose Your Top 5 Innocent Bystander Villain Now Make Your Own Top 5 And Share with Your Friends RANK: AVERAGE:  OUT OF 10 Perpetrated a multi-billion-dollar ponzi scheme, stripping investors -- and more than a few cricket fans -- of their life savings.

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Comments

[armadillious2002]

The biggest villains would "hands down" be the republican party. The party of greed and self indulgence nearly decimated our once great Nation and in their pursuit of the bottom line at the cost of American jobs have delivered the American working class a near fatal blow.

[nomorefed]

Money doesn’t grow on trees for most of America. We sit down at our kitchen tables and write
out checks to the phone-company, electric company, credit card-company, mortgage-company,
and auto finance company every month. We clip coupons and go to the grocery store every
week to put food in the mouths of our children. This is what our parents did before us.

good articles: http://investmintideas.blogspot.com/ recommended

Goldman and Bank of America run the markets along with Geithner, and beagle boy Ben. There
is no free markets, only welfare capitalism and socialism for capitalism.

[Fler]

Bond Analysis Ratings Agencies (S&P, Moody's)

[jerrypl]

The biggest villain has to be Alan Greenspan, followed by Paulson, and Bernanke. They allowed the securitization scamming scheme to go forward overleveraging, credit default swapping, cheap interest rates, as they approved outsourcing. These 3 should be in jail with Madoff. They could play Rummy together.

Had they had honor, and respect for working people and their savings and investments, the banks could not have done what they did.

Other villains are Clinton for signing the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 1999 and doing away with Glass-Steagall. Next, is Bush for pouring gasoline on the already burning economic fire that had been started by the Neocon Congress and Clinton.

http://eye-on-washington.blogspot.com

[Melissa]

Don't forget good old Dodd & Barney Frank and they are still in charge.

[not going2take it]

Our collective government officials (for not *doing the right things*)
with very few exceptions . . . collusion is rampant.

[Rich Hosking]

You got it.

Everyone expects businessmen/women to be corrupt and greedy.

However, our elected officials are supposed to act as advocates of the PUBLIC. The press has totally dropped the ball on exposing--­daily--shi­lls like Lindsey Graham and other tools who have undone our regulatory and tax structure for their own personal and political profit.

[not going2take it]

Exactly!

[lightningbolt]

There are many villains missing from this article. The real supervillains are probably going to be difficult to point out, since they work in secret behind the scenes. I'm surprised Bernanke, Paulson, and Bush are not in the article, since they are mainly responsible for the greatest robbery of all time.

[BabblingBrooks]

Excuse me, but where are the real culprits: Barney Frank, Chris Dodd, Jimmy Carter, Andrew Cuomo, and the execs and board members of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac? Putting up these people, some of whom have surely committed criminal acts (and some not and some who did some good , Phil G for example) is just attempting to distract citizens from the real causes of the financial crisis.

[lightningbolt]

You are just naming democrats because you are a retardican.

[Mikeeee]

You left out nixon and reagan. The two who really started the ball rolling.

[oldcliche]

This report says otherwise.

http://www.traigerlaw.com/publications/traiger_hinckley_llp_cra_foreclosure_study_1-7-08.pdf

[WIpatriot]

You are excused, for obvious reasons.

[Lane4411]

Phil Gramm should be in jail. Bought paid for by UBS. Responsible for The "Enron Loophole" and Deregulation of Credit Default Swaps". Research Dr. Phil, will turn your stomach. Also Gramm's wife Wendy was fined for insider trading while on the Board of Enron. Gramm is a real prize.

[MovingtoNorway]

You forgot members of Congress

[TJCole]

David Rockefeller...the Moriarty of all fiscal inequities...and villainy...and Internatio­nal..fasci­sm...!

[althusius]

After reading Matt Taibbi's article in Rolling Stone, I vote for every CEO of Goldman Sachs during the past twenty years.

[not going2take it]

Collective government #1
Goldman Suchs #2

[elfNW]

Glad to see Phil Gramm`s name up there since he had so much to do with stripping existing regulations on financial companies and preventing any new regulation on derivatives etc. The same Phil Gramm who was for a time McCain`s financial advisor during McCain’s presidential campaign. The Phil Gramm who stated that America was: “A nation of whiners in a mental recession.” The Phil Gramm who went through the revolving door to a high paid position at Credit Suisse.

[texaslib82]

Barney Frank...period...

[BPCentrisAmerican]

Yea he did it all by himself, I'm not sure I would vote for Frank if he was in my district, but to say that is truly stupid, than again you live in Texas.

[Melissa]

Barney Frank and Chris Dodd. The terrible thing is that they are still involved. Something is not right with this picture!

[BPCentrisAmerican]

When our congress and senate are driven by powerful lobbying interest and ideology we get screwed. Every bill that is passed is turned into muck to make some special interest happy. The US needs a industrial policy like the Europeans and Japanese. You might think this socialist or what ever the new buzz word is, it's better than the nonsense system that going on right now. Our government for the most part is living in a bubble, from which they can't delineate between what works and what dosen't. Healthcare is another perfect example, everyone buys a seat at the table insurance companies, AMA, pharma, etc and what results is a mess, which at end of the day, dosen't even address the issues of the idiots who bought the legislation in the 1st place.

[aofh]

I whole heartily agree that the US needs an industrial policy. Or maybe I should say that the US needs a "stated" industrial policy because I think we have one which no one is willing to acknowledge. (The shadowiness of such a policy makes it dangerous.) Such a policy is important because it sets the underlying assumptions and goals for economic development. The current, unstated policy weighs economic development heavily in favor of the financial industry and has proven diasterous for working people, the country and the world. There needs to be a lot more discussion about this to flesh out what our current policy actually is and what it should be. Unfortunately, there is a lot of resistance to declaring an official industrial policy. For some crazy reason people seem to fear that having an official policy will limit what entrepreneurs can do. Such a policy would provide guidance not be law. (I suppose authoritarian types aren't wired to see the difference.)

[actjsk]

There are SO MANY cheaters, how do we pick the greatest of them all?? I bet the new book "Get Rich Cheating" has the answers...
http://GetRichCheating.com
This is THE book to read in the unemployment line." — Lizz Winstead (Co-creator of The Daily Show)

[RazeTemple]

So quick to label and pass the blame...one of those puictures should be a mirror and you've have a more accurate "poll"..It is everybody's fault for allowing the people that let regulation slip in favor of mo money to continue being elected.