One of the author’s previous books, Wages of Destruction previously reviewed, was an outstanding look at the financial world of the Third Reich and how Hitler’s world view and understanding of the strength of the U.S. economy impacted on his decision regarding going to war.  In this massive (almost 700 page) work, the author looks at an even more complex problem, the financial crash of 2007-8 and the later one in Europe.  As one can imagine, this is not a light work, the excellent descriptions of many of the financial vehicles invented by the banks and regulators can be mind numbing.  Not a book to be read lightly, to grasp the complexity of what is written would require a flow chart that would make the invasion of Normandy look like a plaything.  It is because of this complexity that no one at any level could understand, regulate or formulate a strategy to contain the forces that had been let lose several years before the crash. It is in this area that this book fails for while being critical of the banks (worldwide) and fawning over President Obama, he manages to cover in a couple of sentences the role of the politicians (especially President Clinton) and the authors favorite financial advisors (Rubin and Summers) for their roles in passing the Financial Services Modernization Act of 1999 and the easy housing policies of HUD and Andrew Cuomo which led to the housing bubble.