Reckless Endangerment II

On a lark, Schlub checked out Gretchen Morgenson's home page at the NYT and followed the link to Reckless Endangerment. Then I checked out some comments there and at other places, like Huffpo. Lots of deserved praise for the book, but, curiously, a lot of it was misplaced. Most of the commenters were railing against the banks and Wall Street and eeeevil capitalism. Morgenson, herself, seems to be in sympathy with them.
 

Did they read the same book I did?

Because, as was quite clear to Schlub, the banks and Wall Street were merely playing a dealt hand. Our much loved, benevolent and sincerely wonderful government had, through the Community Reinvestment Act, pretty much told the banks to hand out loans to anyone with a pulse, or else. So, they did what you’d do, complied, and turned to Wall Street for "creative" investment instruments that turned a pretty sorry situation into short term profits; like when a tree falls on your house, you sell firewood.  So blaming the banks and Wall Street and eeevil capitalism is a lot like blaming the house owner and his chain saw.

But that’s understandable. Liberals always have problems with the origin of things.