Let me steal a couple of things from an article I'm going to link you to later. First, this graph:
You know what happened. In 1999, Congress repealed the Glass-Steagall Act, which separated commercial and investment banks. Suddenly, your conservative (in a good way), sober, dull local bank started using your life savings to buy the Wall Street version of lottery tickets. By the time things hit the fan in 2008, the banks were "too big to fail," and Uncle Sam had to choose between letting them collapse – which would throw the country into depression – and bailing them out.
Since this fit of Phil Gramm-induced idiocy (signed by Bill Clinton, I might add), just about everybody who wasn't pocketing money from it – and many who have – has called for the return of Glass-Steagall in some form.
Massachusetts' Senator Elizabeth Warren (the Goddess of Due Diligence and Patron Saint of Sanity) has introduced the 21st Century Glass-Steagall Act, with co-sponsors John McCain [!], Angus King, and Maria Cantwell.
Why isn't your senator a co-sponsor? (Cape Cod Bob is justified in smirking at this point.)
Oh, yes. The article I was going to link to. It's at a site called The National Memo, which is new to me but appears to have a political slant towards facts.
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