Washington Post Confuses Saving the Financial Industry with Saving the Financial System

The Washington Post published excerpts from reporter Neil Irwin's new book,The Alchemists: Three Central Bankers and a World on Fire, under the headline, "three days that saved the world financial system." The headline is seriously misleading since it may cause readers to believe the world somehow would have lacked a financial system if the central bankers in Irwin's story had not succeeded in their efforts.

This is not true. Had a financial collapse actually been the outcome, the central ban...