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Like the metastasizing federal tax code, the rescue bill swelled from three pages and $700 billion in its first incarnation to more than $800 billion and 451 pages in just a matter of days.

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Then we had over 25% unemployment; now it's 6% and could move somewhat higher, which is typical for economic corrections. Then, by 1934 about one-half of mortgages were in default, today it is only 6%. Nearly 94% of homeowners are still making their monthly payments.

In 1977, President Carter and a Democrat Congress created the Community Reinvestment Act mandating that banks must meet the credit needs of everyone in the banks' community, including uncreditworthy borrowers. It was done for a good social purpose and had the greatest intentions — expanding home ownership. And, through the 1980s and into the 1990s at least, it seemed to work.

However in 1995, President Bill Clinton imposed more and stronger regulations and performance tests. These coerced banks into significantly increasing their loans to low-income borrowers in economically-troubled communities, or face possible fines and expansion restrictions.

These new rules encouraged banks to bundle their risky subprime loans together with prime loans and re-sell them in packages to other financial institutions, thereby freeing the original lenders from any further risk. Thanks to the new rules and oversight from the CRA, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac got involved in a big way, buying literally trillions of dollars of the questionable loans from banks and feeding the dangerous cycle that had begun.

Eventually, it turned into a kind of pyramid scheme that overwhelmed some lending organizations when housing prices softened in late 2006 and 2007.

Did Frank have a conflict of interest at Fannie Mae?

Awesome: New GOP ad lowers the boom on Dems over subprime disaster

Buzz up!

More of this. More of this. Nothing but this for the next 32 days.

The election hangs on this single issue.

The public believes Republicans caused this disaster, and we'll lose based on that misperception.

The Democrats actually caused it -- but Republicans, beginning at the top off the ticket, are inexplicably shy about saying so.

More of this. More of this.

If this US News blog post is correct, then I want McCain's people to tell me so, so I can stop blogging about McCain entirely and focus on limiting the damage in Congressional races.

If McCain wants to lose the election like a good trooper -- a dutiful soldier going off to die in a no-win mission he's not even supposed to win -- he really should have informed the party of this intention during the primaries.

Video: Biden says “No coal plants in America”

Joe Biden tried mightily to reverse course from a comment made at a rally in Ohio, in which he said he opposed clean-coal plants in America. He claimed in the debate that the rope-line comments were taken “out of context”, but he sounded categorical in his opposition to new coal plants of any kind in the US, as this video demonstrates.

“We’re not supporting clean coal.”

“No coal plants here in America.  Build them if they’re going to build them over there.  Make them clean.”

Those are very definitive statements, not taken at all out of context.  Biden was talking about exporting the technology to China, but also opposed very clearly the use of that technology in the US.  In other words, Biden wants to help China create jobs in energy, but keep Americans from finding work in that same sector.

Those are his words.  He may want to disavow that now, but that was what he said on that rope line in Ohio.

“Mother of all gaffes”

Like Rick, I cannot recall anyone seriously suggesting that NATO occupy the sub-Litani region of Lebanon.  NATO already found itself stretched to meet its commitments in Afghanistan, although Germany and Italy did find troops to contribute to the beefed-up presence in UNIFIL, the same multinational force that had sat idle while Hezbollah armed itself after the Israeli withdrawal from the region a few years ago — and then turned around and did the same thing after the Israeli withdrawal in 2006.

And all of this points out the folly of presidential-level meetings with the leadership of Iran, without the precondition of them ending their support for the terrorist group Hezbollah.  Iran funds Hezbollah and their terrorist activities, which Biden rightly decries.  But if Biden doesn’t want Hezbollah to be a “legitimate part” of the Lebanese government for that reason, why would he legitimize their sponsors with presidential-level meetings without first insisting on the end of that support?

It’s a completely incoherent policy as well as a terrible misreading of history and the present status of the region. And if Biden can’t get this right, what does that say about his running mate, who chose Biden to fill the gaps in his own foreign-policy portfolio?

Biden blows softball question, brags about becoming more ideological

McCain ad: Lies and Sighs

1. TAX VOTE: Biden said McCain voted “the exact same way” as Obama to increase taxes on Americans earning just $42,000, but McCain DID NOT VOTE THAT WAY.

2. AHMEDINIJAD MEETING: Joe Biden lied when he said that Barack Obama never said that he would sit down unconditionally with Mahmoud Ahmedinijad of Iran. Barack Obama did say specifically, and Joe Biden attacked him for it.

3. OFFSHORE OIL DRILLING: Biden said, “Drill we must.” But Biden has opposed offshore drilling and even compared offshore drilling to “raping” the Outer Continental Shelf.”

4. TROOP FUNDING: Joe Biden lied when he indicated that John McCain and Barack Obama voted the same way against funding the troops in the field. John McCain opposed a bill that included a timeline, that the President of the United States had already said he would veto regardless of it’s passage.

5. OPPOSING CLEAN COAL: Biden says he’s always been for clean coal, but he just told a voter that he is against clean coal and any new coal plants in America and has a record of voting against clean coal and coal in the U.S. Senate.

6. ALERNATIVE ENERGY VOTES: According to FactCheck.org, Biden is exaggerating and overstating John McCain’s record voting for alternative energy when he says he voted against it 23 times.

7. HEALTH INSURANCE: Biden falsely said McCain will raise taxes on people’s health insurance coverage — they get a tax credit to offset any tax hike. Independent fact checkers have confirmed this attack is false

8. OIL TAXES: Biden falsely said Palin supported a windfall profits tax in Alaska — she reformed the state tax and revenue system, it’s not a windfall profits tax.

9. AFGHANISTAN / GEN. MCKIERNAN COMMENTS: Biden said that top military commander in Iraq said the principles of the surge could not be applied to Afghanistan, but the commander of NATO’s International Security Assistance Force Gen. David D. McKiernan said that there were principles of the surge strategy, including working with tribes, that could be applied in Afghanistan.

10. REGULATION: Biden falsely said McCain weakened regulation — he actually called for more regulation on Fannie and Freddie.

11. IRAQ: When Joe Biden lied when he said that John McCain was “dead wrong on Iraq”, because Joe Biden shared the same vote to authorize the war and differed on the surge strategy where they John McCain has been proven right.

12. TAX INCREASES: Biden said Americans earning less than $250,000 wouldn’t see higher taxes, but the Obama-Biden tax plan would raise taxes on individuals making $200,000 or more.

13. BAILOUT: Biden said the economic rescue legislation matches the four principles that Obama laid out, but in reality it doesn’t meet two of the four principles that Obama outlined on Sept. 19, which were that it include an emergency economic stimulus package, and that it be part of “part of a globally coordinated effort with our partners in the G-20.”

14. REAGAN TAX RATES: Biden is wrong in saying that under Obama, Americans won’t pay any more in taxes then they did under Reagan.

Ever since Al Gore lost the debate to George Bush with his exaggerated gestures of impatience, partisans on both sides have conducted a Sigh Watch.  Most people don’t care about it unless it becomes obvious, as it did in 2000, when Gore clearly wanted to communicate that Bush didn’t belong on the stage with Gore’s gigantic intellect.  Otherwise, a sigh is just a sigh — and it’s the fundamental things that apply as time goes by.