I agree with you on nearly all points with the exception of the Fed. Interest rates were kept low not as corporate giveaways but as monetary stimulus, to keep the economy going. The Fed's job is a balancing act, raising and lowering interest rates and using other tools to keep the inherently unstable economic system we rely on, capitalism, on an even keel.

You remember the 'stagflation' of the '70s, I'm sure. One of the reasons Carter was booted out of office was because the Fed, with Carter's approval, kept interest rates breathtakingly high as a way of reigning in then galloping inflation. That, and other gov policies followed by the administration artificially stifled economic growth, on purpose. It took years, but they succeeded. And as inflation went away the Feds dropped interest rates. But in the meantime Carter took the hit, like a good president should (the good die young,..), and had to wave goodbye to the oval office after only four years (it wasn't just the ayatollah that did him in; 'it's the economy, stupid' as Clinton used to say!).