Over the past decade, the federal government has thrown a lifeline to
everything from Long-Term Capital Management, a troubled hedge fund, to
the airline and insurance industries after the Sept. 11 terrorist
attacks in 2001. More recently, mortgage finance giants Fannie Mae and
Freddie Mac joined the club. But how many
corporate bailouts are too many? And with Lehman brothers and the
Big Three automakers now lining up to the trough for taxpayer-funded
bailouts, has the government established a reckless precedent? On MSNBC
last week, The Nation‘s Naomi Klein lays out the perils of
granting high-risk loans without government regulation, directly
implicating the failed policies of the Bush Administration and its grand
strategy to build an “Ownership Society”.
–Will Di Novi
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