This letter to the NYTimes on Friday points out one of them.

To the Editor:

If there is an original sin in the Obama administration, it is the fateful decision not to initiate an F.D.I.C.-style takeover of the American banking sector upon its collapse. Had the administration taken that step, taking over the insolvent banks, firing management and recapitalizing them on sound footing,much subsequent history would have been different. Once it lashed itself to the mast of a broken financial industry, however, putting the entire economy at the mercy of people focused on the size of their bonuses rather than the health of the economy, the administration could only hang on, silently and single-mindedly working to recapitalize the banks. Anything that threatened to interfere with that overriding priority ? exposing bad debts, reining in the foreclosure mess and, yes, aggressively investigating illegal activity by corrupt financial executives ? had to take a back seat.

FRANCOIS FURSTENBERG

Montreal, April 14, 2011^