I don’t know if you are anything like me, but when the financial crisis burst upon us in 2008, you probably went searching for sources of information to explain what was going on as Mr. Paulson presented the American people with Wall Street’s bill for 700 billion dollars to save them and us from economic ruin. This bailout became an obvious embarrassment to the neoliberal, free marketers and right wing conservatives who had been such hearty cheerleaders for the wonders of “free” enterprise. Right wing radio punditry and Republican leadership, in general, quickly developed a narrative that blamed the whole crisis on the excesses of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and liberal do-gooders, like Barney Frank, who pushed too many poor and unreliable borrowers (read minorities) into the housing market. There could be no acknowledgment from these quarters, or the mainstream media, for that matter, of anything wrong with the system itself.
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