Senseless Panic
How Washington Failed America

The 1980s opened with the prime interest rate at an astonishing 21. 5 percent, leading to a severe recession with unemployment reaching nearly 11 percent.

With accessible and engaging prose, Isaac:
* Details the mistakes that led to the panic of 2008 and 2009
*Demystifies the conditions America faced in 2008, and
*Provides a roadmap for avoiding similar shutdowns and panics in the future Senseless Panicis a provocative, quick-paced, and thoughtful analysis of what went wrong with the nation's banking system and a blunt indictment of United States policy.

Foreword. Acknowledgments. Introduction. Part One: No Calm Before the Storm. Chapter 1 Home Alone. Chapter 2 The Early Years (1978 -1981). Chapter 3 The Savings Bank and S&
L Crises. Chapter 4 Penn Square Fails. Chapter 5 The Butcher Empire Collapses. Chapter 6 Deposit Insurance Reform/Tackling Wall Street. Chapter 7 Continental Illinois Topples. Chapter 8 Preparing to Leave. Chapter 9 Lessons Learned. Part Two: Here We Go Again. Chapter 10 Policy Mistakes-1989 through 2007. Chapter 11 The Subprime Mortgage Problem. Chapter 12 SEC and FASB Blunders. Chapter 13 Schizophrenic Failure Resolution. Chapter 14 The $700 Billion Bailout. Chapter 15 Never Again. Afterword. Authors' Notes on Sources. About the Authors. Index.