“When investment bank Lehman Brothers filed for the largest bankruptcy in the history of the United States four years ago on Sept. 15, 2008, shock and fear spread throughout the global financial system. The underlying weakness of the financial system was fast becoming transparent. The collapse of other banks was imminent; ultimately the whole financial system was threatened. 

There would be no government rescue of investment bank Lehman Brothers as there had been for Bear Stearns earlier that year. Panic followed the decision not to save Lehman. The federal government, with Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson from the Bush administration at the helm, set upon preventing the nation’s leading financial institutions from sliding into bankruptcy. Hurriedly, emergency measures were taken to avert another Great Depression. The federal government authorized $700 billion to stabilize banks under TARP (Troubled Asset Relief Program) passed in October 2008. ..”

Read Gary Feuerberg’s full article here