Fannie and Freddie.

You can blame the two for any lobbying money given Gingrich and his crew just as you might blame them had they handed money over to pirates, but there's good writing out there suggesting only Limbaugh and the hyper-gullible would blame them for the housing bubble, or its collapse, based on claims they fueled the making of imprudent loans leading to the nonperforming post-collapse mortgage glut. Krugman, citing Nocera. The propaganda of the right wing, the massive wing vs. any other, has been to blame Fannie and Freddie because otherwise folks would see that it was the privateers, those Wall Street greed mongers, at fault. And the effort failed, with instead the public having enough sense to blame Wall Street greed but to then also take the further step to blame Fannie and Freddie as confederates. Except, facts intrude. And facts can convince, except perhaps for the gullible few, or those who'd argue the lame-blame case because they've no better excuse while unwilling to accord blame where it's been earned by Wall Street privateers. Fannie and Freddie, in fact, were more prudent then the market; and everyone knows the right wing professes great love for the market - to the point of dishonestly characterizing it as blameless while all it is is a casino full of greedy seedy but wealthy gamblers. Adam Smith's invisible hand notwithstanding. Either it was the market, or something else. Quick, find and scapegoat somebody, ideally the government, or the semi-governmental F-corporations. Yeah, they'll do. Put the hounds on them then.