Ever since the Federal Reserve bailed out AIG in late 2008, the true significance of the so-called Maiden Lane III component of the deal has escaped me.

For those new to my horribly "populist" interest in the Fed, the bank set up vehicles called Maiden Lane to hold the assets it bought from a number of bailed-out institutions, evidently thinking that parking dodgy assets in vehicles named after one of those dark and windy little streets in the downtown Manhattan shadows of the New York Fed was entirely appropriate.

This segment of the Bill Moyers television show was a angry screed against Wall Street, and perhaps an easily dismissible rant from the embittered left.

But it contained an interesting revelation that might cause banks and regulators to sit up and take note. According to Ohio Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur, a court ruling in Cleveland has let home buyers who have defaulted on their mortgages stay in their homes even though the banks have foreclosed.

The last 12 months have not been good ones for banks and financiers by any stretch of the imagination.

Lehman Brothers collapsed almost exactly a year ago in the largest bankruptcy in U.S. history. The credit markets froze. Home foreclosures continue to rise. Three more banks failed this past weekend, bringing the year-to-date total to 84. Scores of financial institutions required government bailouts while the broader economy went into a nosedive.

In general, it would be difficult to argue that finance's reputation has improved much on Main Street.

However, looking at October's issue of Vanity Fair, you may not realize all of that. In its ‘New Establishment' list of the most powerful people of the Information Age, four financiers graced the Top Ten, compared to two in 2008. A banker--Goldman Sachs chief executive Lloyd Blankfein--even managed to grab the #1 position. Last year he was all the way down at #20, the first time he made the list.