WALL STREET ROCK ‘N’ ROLL: A LETTER TO THE ECONOMIST (January 30, 2011)
When the American Congress set up the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission to come to grips with the Great Recession, you dubbed it “a Depression-era crusade against Wall Street” (“That 1930s Show,” January 9, 2010). Chaired by Phil Angelides, the Democratic former treasurer of California, the bipartisan commission’s report was late by a month when it came out on January 27. In addition, the report got split three ways: six Democrats issued the main report, three Republicans issued a dissenting one, and one Republican came up with a separate report (“Take Your Pick,” January 29, 2011). The first report blames Wall Street, as you suspected all along, the second blames general laxity about leverage, and the third blames government policies aimed at increasing home ownership among the poor. A disaster, in short. But the evidence produced by nineteen days of public hearings and over seven-hundred interviews is in the public domain. Careful scrutiny of the evidence will eventually lead to a verdict worth considering. Chances are it will show that unbridled capitalism, ushered by Ronald Regan and Margaret Thatcher, is the culprit. And Wall Street is its heart and soul.