The vast majority of the bottom 8,000 banks are likely to be found to be largely blameless.  I plan to have discussions with two local bank v.p.s asap on this subject.  My guess is that the top 100 banking institutions in the USA share >99% of the banking culpability, with probably 90% belonging to the top 10.  If we could just get the top ten safely in the ground, with stakes through their hearts, recovery could begin.  I suspect that these guys will agree.  Their banks were conservatively run and are now making loans and advertising the availability of loans.  The whole non-bank "mortgage origination" and "mortgage broker" business was a creation of the de-regulators.

As the Dutch said while fighting the Spanish: "It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."