The "occupy wallstreet" loons

Those minority clients in this case are the big banks. If a fellow citizen bribes an official to pass a law that helps him and hurt the rest, will you only blame the politician, or both? Add in that the citizen also commits several accounts of fraud and the politician turns the shoulder since he was paid- do you still defend the citizen?

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According to a 2009 policy report from the libertarian Cato Institute authored by one of the institute's directors, Mark A. Calabria, critics of the legislation [bank deregulation of 1999] feared that, with the allowance for mergers between investment and commercial banks, GLB allowed the newly-merged banks to take on riskier investments while at the same time removing any requirements to maintain enough equity, exposing the assets of its banking customers.[29] Calabria claimed that, prior to the passage of GLB in 1999, investment banks were already capable of holding and trading the very financial assets claimed to be the cause of the mortgage crisis, and were also already able to keep their books as they had.[29] He concluded that greater access to investment capital as many investment banks went public on the market explains the shift in their holdings to trading portfolios.[29] Calabria noted that after GLB passed, most investment banks did not merge with depository commercial banks, and that in fact, the few banks that did merge weathered the crisis better than those that did not.[29]
When Bill Clinton was asked in 2008 whether he regretted the decision to sign the bill rolling back the Glass-Steagall Act and deregulate banking during his presidency, Clinton responded:

"I don't see that signing that bill had anything to do with the current crisis. Indeed, one of the things that has helped stabilize the current situation as much as it has is the purchase of Merrill Lynch by Bank of America, which was much smoother than it would have been if I hadn't signed that bill.... On the Glass?Steagall thing, like I said, if you could demonstrate to me that it was a mistake, I'd be glad to look at the evidence." [30]

In February 2009, one of the act's co-authors, former Senator Phil Gramm, also defended his bill:

"...if GLB was the problem, the crisis would have been expected to have originated in Europe where they never had Glass?Steagall requirements to begin with. Also, the financial firms that failed in this crisis, like Lehman, were the least diversified and the ones that survived, like J.P. Morgan, were the most diversified.
" Moreover, GLB didn't deregulate anything. It established the Federal Reserve as a superregulator, overseeing all Financial Services Holding Companies. All activities of financial institutions continued to be regulated on a functional basis by the regulators that had regulated those activities prior to GLB." [31]

The economists Brad DeLong (of the University of California, Berkeley) and Tyler Cowen (of George Mason University in Virginia) have both argued that the Gramm?Leach?Bliley Act softened the impact of the crisis.[32] Atlantic Monthly columnist Megan McArdle has argued that if the act was "part of the problem, it would be the commercial banks, not the investment banks, that were in trouble" and repeal would not have helped the situation.[33]

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myp said:

Proof of which part? That there was moral hazard? That they committed fraud? That profits have been privatized and losses socialized?

I find it sadly ironic that you are so keen on defending these big banks who if they could would squeeze you for all you have if it meant greater profit for the partners. Trust me, I used to argue that they were in the right too- until I realized they just bought government and have committed several serious crimes over the years that just get overlooked by their bought friends in DC. The government sells out- the banks (among others) do the buying and the people do the paying.

Oh and arguing for them isn't a pro-capitalism argument- they've rigged the market. They no longer operate in a free market or anything even close to it.

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