The mortgage situation is more nuanced than not reading a brochure for cell phone insurance. In the housing case, shelter and getting into the home equity "up-elevator" is perceived as necessary for a decent life. One would expect that people, especially with a lawyer at their side, would spend more time on the house thing; but there are complications. It's reasonable to believe that you can't have a good life without owning a home in America, which causes people to view risks with a wishful eye. The people renting money to consumers, and charging closing fees surrounding the transaction, also have a clear interest to underplay the risks wherever possible. I would guess that the number of people who were adequately warned and then ignored the warnings about equals the number who where "told", with a wink and smile, that they could easily afford 50% of their net income as a home payment because if they ever got in trouble, they could simply borrow against the equity that would show up in mere months. There's way too much money in it for people to be honest about the risks all the time. These people are in sales, and have a quota...why should their behavior be different from any other salesperson? At the end of the day, I still believe that people are smart enough to see through that kind of thing, and should be wary...and pay the price for failed risks. (Proposals to save neighborhoods are more reasonable to me.) But, since we've agreed to save shareholders of any big bank that goes down, we need an agreement in return similar to that we have with public utilities: we'll limit your profits, in this case by forcing you to have a much less risky portfolio than you would otherwise have.

Gansler is a hack- I had no idea about the personal connection with his son. A Baltimore Sun article quoted him as saying- "If anybody knew upfront that they're spending $5 a month for the life of the phone, plus a $50 deductible and they get a used phone ... nobody would buy this service," the attorney general said. This was later dropped from future reports of the story. Sounds like he had an axe to grind does it not?

The mortgage industry was allowed to scam clients. The financial industry was allowed to invest in dubious highly leveraged vehicles (without transparency). The government is allowed to print money when the going gets tough . . . and bail out the housing and financial sectors. Cayne and other CEOs get to walk away (with $60 million when Cayne cashed in) and no personal consequences. Hedge funds are allowed to manipulate the market without regulation or transparency. How can we expect the average citizen to accept this double standard on responsibility? When our leaders model personal responsibility -- and insist on integrity in the system -- then others will follow their example. Leadership, by definition, has to come from the top.