Stii digging trying to get to the bottom of this financial crisis...more interesting stuff:

Over a twenty year period, three Demcorats received the most lobbyist's money from Freddie Mac anbd Fannie Mae who wanted to keep regulators off their back. One managed to jump to the number two spot depsite having been in the Senate less than four of those twenty years:

Most amounts received from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac over the last 20 years cumulative:

1. Chris Dodd - (D - CT) - $165,000
2. Barack Obama - (D - IL) - $126,349
3. John Kerry (D - MA) - $111,000

Chris Dodd has been a mmeber of the Senate's Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs for years, and apparently had some beneficial asscoiations with Country Wide. Barack Obama claims he was conerned about this issue, but did not decide to co-sponsor a 2005 attempt to create an independent agency and regulatory reforms to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. John McCain did co-sponosor the bill however. For more information, see:

http://hotair.com/archives/2008/09/17/mccains-attempt-to-fix-fannie-mae-freddie-mac-in-2005/