Tracing Bailout Money in the Banks: the Journalists are Asking the Wrong Question

It is good sport to call someone at the large banks that have received government bailout money and ask:  "Were did the money go?"  The right answer to a physical tracing question is "I do not know."  It is the wrong question.  Cash is fungible and not sensibly traceable physically.  Cash used for one purpose frees up cash for another.  The right question has to be "What did the bank do once it received the grants that it would not have done had it not received the grants?"  Once asked this way the questioner would get a reasonable answer.  Banks worried about capital reserves would be folly to lend more money in high- risk consumer or business markets, increasing capital reserve calculation problems; they sensible would buttress capital reserve ratios by holding the cash (or securities that count as cash) or using cash to pay off liabilities that count against the capital reserve.  Why pillory banks for doing what is prudent in a down economy?  They have be critizied for making excessive risky loans to "people who could not pay" and are now lending very, conservatively.  If the the government wants more risky loan made, the government will have to do it (nationalizing a private bank to use as a conduit or using the Treasure dollars or the Fed's reserves).