Mark to market cause the economic crisis?

[Narkos]

I have a winger friend who claims that the mark to market rule mandated by Sarbanes Oxley is the cause of our current woes. I'm guessing he read this
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122178886027855303.html?mod=googlenews_wsj#articleTabs%3Darticle

I call bullshit, another sneaky right wing attempt to blame regulation on the financial crisis. Any good rebuttals?

[MannyGoldstein]

1. Mandating That Companies Value Assets At Market Value Is A Bad Thing?

WTF? Only in Right Wing World.

[Narkos]

2. I'm plagiarizing this, but it's funny....

"Translation: We can sell more shells if we don't have to show people whether or not there's a pea inside." Ha ha. That's what it's really all about, isn't it? We let these jokers guess how much these investments were worth, and when they are shown to be completely hollow, they're forced to mark them down.....these guys were all skating on very thin ice!