The credibility crunch

As I mentioned briefly last week in Zeitlinks, one of the greatest casualties of the current financial crisis will likely be the credibility of American-style, lightly-regulated capitalism. Today, via FP Passport, I saw that President Lula da Silva of Brazil couldn't resist taking a potshot at the American banks involved:

Important banks -- very important banks -- that spent their lives giving advice about Brazil and what we should or shouldn't do are now broke.

Ouch.