Barack Obama calls the “Wall Street crisis” a direct result of failed Bush policies and claims that John McCain will continue those same policies. However a simple look at the time lines and facts prove otherwise. The New York Post had an article today, that can be read here, that sheds a little light on the subject.

Back in 1999, Congress opened the door to the subprime mortgage crisis when it repealed the Glass-Steagall Act, the 66-year firewall between commercial banks and investment houses.

Though sponsored by two Republicans and supported by the GOP majority in Congress, it was signed into law by then-President Clinton and enthusiastically endorsed by both his Treasury secretary, Robert Rubin, and then-Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan.

I bipartisan bill signed by Bill Clinton was the beginning of the end. Sure the bill was sponsored by Republicans but many prominent Democrats loved this bill also.

New York’s Democratic Sen. Charles Schumer hailed passage of the bill as “a historic day,” and its promoters included Sen. Christopher Dodd

The problem started because lending restrictions were loosened and people who had no business qualifying for mortgages were suddenly being approved for them.

the repeal also encouraged banks to make intemperate high-risk loans and to create exotic new financial products.

When more and more individuals who took loans they could not afford suddenly couldn’t make their monthly payments, the mortgage holders looked to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which guaranteed the mortgages.

All the way up until the recent failure Charlie Schumer was trying to make loans even easier for low income families to get. President Bush was against this idea.