“The world’s finance officials will huddle this weekend in Washington to deal with the worst financial crisis since the Depression. Many leaders have already decided that the source of global fears lies in the US economic model. But which part of that ‘model’ really needs fixing? The German finance minister predicts the US will no longer be the ’superpower’ in global finance. The French president said the model of ‘laissez-faire economics is finished.’ Russia’s president said the dominance of the US economy ‘has been consigned to the past.’ Indeed, this crisis can be traced to US financial institutions taking on borrowers who signed mortgage contracts they could not afford. Those loans were then passed up the food chain to investors worldwide with little oversight over whether the home buyers might default if prices fell.” (10/08/08)