Have you seen...
This story by the NY Times where the five biggest investment banks in the US lobby to reduce capital requirements of 10:1 in April of 2004? Page three has a link to the audio recording of that meeting. It was very friendly.
Thank goodness people from those same Investment Banks are crafting the bailout plan for us today!
The discussion of capital requirements, faith in models "that calculate", ability to "revisit" capital requirements in the future, concern that small firms could not participate because of the high minimum amount of net capital required, when that requirement was an absolute amount, not an amount based upon the amount of exposure was satisfied by the answer that the five firms large enough to participate were "sophisticated" and that made it ok.
It sounds an awful lot like the BS I am hearing today about the bailout plan.