U.S. is blamed for spawning global financial crisis

Add Germany to the list of countries less than impressed with the Bush administration and Wall Street.

Germany blamed the United States on Thursday for spawning the global financial crisis with a blind drive for higher profits and said it would now have to accept greater market regulation and a loss of its financial superpower status. [...]

"The world will never be as it was before the crisis," Steinbrueck, a deputy leader of the centre-left Social Democrats (SPD), told the Bundestag lower house.

"The United States will lose its superpower status in the world financial system. The world financial system will become more multi-polar," he said.

Germany recognized we were headed for trouble over a year ago and tried to do something about it to no avail.

Chancellor Angela Merkel, whose conservatives rule in coalition with the SPD, and Steinbrueck both pushed the Group of Eight (G8) to agree measures to boost financial market transparency during Germany's presidency of the G8 last year.

But their drive collapsed amid opposition from Washington and London.

Merkel criticized their stance at the weekend, saying the days of laissez-faire capitalism were over.

It's not just Germany either. The criticism comes from other countries too.

The German views were echoed by leaders of governments from around the world meeting this week at the United Nations in New York.

Many sharply criticized the George W. Bush administration's financial record and warned that U.S. financial mistakes now threatened the global economy.

Financial mistakes? I'm not convinced the Bush administration made a mistake. I think they knew all along what the outcome would be, but didn't give a damn as long as they kept raking in the money.