Economy (Opinions about Housing)

I have not voiced any opinions on the crisis with the U.S. Economy and figured it was time to share my thoughts.
I guess I will start with the 'housing crisis.'
I do not believe it is a crisis. Yes, people are losing their homes. Yes, people are getting buried under monthly housing payments. At the risk of sounding callous, SO? I fail to see how bad financial planning constitutes a crisis that my tax dollars should go toward fixing.
If the companies that sold the loans used unfair tactics, sleight of hand tricks or any other sort of illegal (or perhaps simply immoral) methods to get people these loans, then it would be different. But since all reports seem to be that people got loans using variable rates (starting a low introductory rate! Sounds like a credit card, huh?) and now that the economy took a slight downturn the rates went up and people cannot afford their homes.
NEWSFLASH!
These people never could afford their homes to begin with. If they could not afford the fixed rate loans, they had no business HOPING they could continue to pay. They gambled their lives on interest rates. If they gambled their life savings in Vegas and lost, would I be hearing about it on the news? No. Why is this gamble any different from the others?
Again, I am not dispassionate. I think that banks should offer new loans at fixed rates, or perhaps variable rates with caps. Give the people a chance to redo and start over from their mistakes. If they are behind on payments, maybe give them some extra grace time or a slightly lower rate for certain amount of time. It does the banks no go to default on all of these loans either. Work together for a solution.
However, do not involve my tax dollars in this. I understand that the 'housing crisis' is causing or is at a minimum increasing the trouble in the U.S. Economy. I understand people are losing their place to sleep. Yet, at the same time, millions of people in the United States continue to make their home payments on time despite the rise in rates. They had enough buffer to get them through this 'hard time'. Why do we, the one that planned for this, have to bail those that didn't plan out of debt?
I do not think we should. I think that we need to help these people find affordable housing. Helping them keep these homes does not qualify, because this has proven that their current living conditions are not 'affordable.'
I believe we need, as a society, to look at other nations for guidance in terms of family units. In our own country you can see from immigrants or their children that they generally have close family units, with multible generations living in the same household. Grandparents living with their children, living with their children. Many Latino and Asian cultures show this. It seems to be a viable method of both keeping a close knit family group, and providing better living conditions for all. Why not try going back towards that?
Just a thought.
Because if you can't pay your housing payment, you may end up in mom's basement anyway.

Thoughts from: Dakar