This is completely without context. I mean I hate to be defending the govt. but at the time, they basically were told, "give us cash or the world burns."

This by the same guys who helped slowly get all the checks and balances to prevent precisely their behavior, removed.

It was the government that continued the existence of a terrible system because the most vulnerable were held hostage by the financial institutions. Which are now once again slowly fighting to get their rules re instated.