What happened to screw over Americans? You see Bank of America got greedy and shoveled toxic derivatives out of their recently purchased Merrill Lynch and into the part of the bank that is insured by the U.S. government: taxpayers.
That way the Merrill Lynch unit of Bank of America will not be responsible for what could be as much as $75 TRILLION in this toxic dump. That's how much of this garbage they have in house. To get perspective on this, the annual American economy is only $15 trillion.