Brother, Can You Spare a Dime

Some people may consider Matt Taibbi a "muckraker" which has negative connotations to me, I am a fan (what some may perceive as biasis, I consider passion, in his writings)...This is a link to a follow-up article on the fleecing of Jefferson County Alabama by Wall Street (there is also a link to the original article, which I read last year).  I think that generally, when folks talk about the current economic crisis, they reference primarily the housing market, but the problem is (and remains) much bigger than housing...Financial institutions worked their snake-salesman oil pitch (I hope I got the reference right!) on all segments of the market---from the derivatives that were sold to P&G in the mid-to-late 90s to the exotic funding mechanisms sold to public governments, no one was safe!  These guys and gals have been insulated from  more scrutiny because of the wide ranging belief that they are so much smarter than everyone else...I contend that they are quite simply much less ethical than everyone else...I would like to think that the era of them (the bankers) being considered "untouchable" is over, but its not.  It will manifest itself in another incarnation as politicians continue to follow the money trail and sacrifice the collective good for the benefits of political cash, connections and even future "symbolic" employment (i.e., see Judd Gregg, Harold Ford and others) where they trade their the political ties for large paychecks.