Goldman Sachs would like to go back to doing what it was doing, thank you

Nothing short of a full financial meltdown will convince these folks that what they are doing is un-American and bad for the country. Only when their mountain of dollars and accumulated assets mean little because crippling deflation has taken hold by mechanism of a depression will Wall Street return to Smith Barney (commercially advertised) prudence and earn their money the old fashioned way.

Business as usual is the worst scenario for U.S. and the rest of the world. Goldman Sachs had a near death experience. If the government wouldn't have intervened to save AIG, they wouldn't be very happy today (maybe they wouldn't be here today). People forget that American tax-payers actually gave money to Goldman Sachs through AIG because AIG was in huge debt to Goldman Sachs, which they wouldn't have received had AIG gone bankrupt. This money was not returned to the government when Goldman Sachs paid back its direct bailout. I don't think we can say that a company has good management if they take risks so huge that even when they bet right they need help from the government (and so tax-payers) to get their premium. Business as usual only means moral hazard as usual.

Terry M. I.

I am assuming tc125231 is being sarcastic. However, he/she raised some good points that people should pay more attention:

1-) The Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) can't be blamed for the crisis.
http://blogs.businessweek.com/investing/insights/blog/archives/2008/09/community_reinv.html

2-) It is anyway irrational to expect that common people should do better financial work than banks. It is irrational to blame common people for hurting banks. On the other hand, banks should know better about investments than common people and shouldn't make billion dollar miscalculations (an amount not at all small).

3-) It is just immoral to use billions from tax-payers in bailouts for banks and refuse to expand demand by improving health care and education. And it is just unacceptable to have your financial system threatened by some banks as it is unacceptable to have your homeland security threatened by some terrorists.

4-) Miscalculation is a soft term. In fact, there is no miscalculation when a bank underwrites a product, disapproves publicly this product and buys insurance against it. Indeed, it is rather a very bold although socially perverse strategy. And bold only if there is someone to bail you out in case of “miscalculations”.

5-) It is a perfect situation for a financial institution to be officially regarded as a commercial bank but still act as an investment bank. Even a child can make a profit lending money borrowed from the FED at almost 0% interest. Nevertheless, I am still not able to open my bank account going to http://www2.goldmansachs.com/

By the way, I got my grip years ago!
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00005QENZ?ie=UTF8&tag=aerosmith.com-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=B00005QENZ

Terry M. I.