Confidence crisis

I keep hearing about a credit crisis and the banks need to get off their butts and start lending again, but I think the problem now is one of confidence. If the market can tank so quickly and the housing boom was basically an Enron type scheme that artificially drove up prices on properties and subsequently lost all of the gains in a rapid decline, you have to ask the question; how much of this is real wealth to begin with and how much was manipulation? Can we say the wealth existed in the first place if it was based on flawed or fraudulent practices? I don't think so. Did the equity that the shareholders of Enron really disappear or was it like a bank robber with a few bags of money, sure he might be rich on paper but it is not legitimate. The government is attacking the credit crisis from many angles, but I think they are missing or unwilling to admit that the American consumer/investor does not trust what is going on. Can there really be much confidence in a system that has been so volatile (i.e risky) over the last decade and filled with bad financial examples such as the dot com collapse, the accounting scandals, and now the housing mess? The shake out has only begun and government intervention may only serve to extend the life of many terminal patients before they die and in the process misspend a staggering amount of money on certain players as deemed appropriate by King Paulson.