On the heel of the recent JP Morgan fiasco, American Enterprise Economist John Makin makes the case for how Dodd-Frank is an insufficient guarantor of financial stability.

Prohibiting their bond trading will seriously weaken banks and the markets that banks supply with liquidity.

Secretary Geithner argued that we have forgotten the reasons that the Dodd-Frank Act was necessary, and that's why the act has become so controversial. What the secretary seems to have missed is that we have learned a lot in the intervening years. The administration's rush to judgment on the financial crisis is a case study in why it would have been worthwhile to wait for the facts.

Many people, observing the severe problems caused by Greece and other financially weak members of the European Union, wonder why the United States is not similarly afflicted. After all, the structures seem quite similar; the EU is united through a treaty into a single political grouping, while the U.S. is a union of states in a constitutional system. 

When the bubble deflated in 2007, an unprecedented number of weak mortgages went into default - those that were held or guaranteed by Fannie and Freddie, and those that had been securitized by Wall Street. This drove down housing prices and threw Fannie and Freddie into insolvency. 

The financial crisis in Europe seems very complex, but we understand that how it comes out will have important and perhaps painful consequences for Americans as well as Europeans. As a guide for the perplexed, here are some Qs and As that might shed some light on why we are where we are.

If we hope to have a viable banking industry in the future, the Volcker Rule - among many other provisions of the Dodd-Frank should be revisited now.

Europe has recently achieved a single currency but still lacks a single financial market. Commissioner Frits Bolkestein of the European Commission (the body that initiates Community policy and represents the general interest of the European Union) will address this issue and describe an ambitious project now underway, and set...