9/22    Roaring 20s       --> Great Depression
        Roaring Millenium --> Great Depression II
        \_ does our state have a BUDGET yet?
           More concerning is we are about to hand $700B to one person and our
           Fed chief Ben Bernanke fully supports this idea--and if you Dems,
           Republicans, and libertarians haven't figured out by now:
           He who controls the money has the power.
           \_ Oh, I get it!  In our crisis, we're appointing a Dictator.
              \_ but he knows much more about finances than you do and he wants
                 to help you
                 \_ Right after he helps himself and his former i-banking
                    buddies.
                    \_ but Ben Bernanke supports the plan, and he has a Ph.D.
                       in Economics from MIT, did his dissertation on the Great
                       Depression, got his B.S. in Economics from Harvard, was
                       class valedictorian and got the highest score on the SAT
                       in his state when he took it.  He wrote three books on
                       macroeconomics!  He chaired the Princeton Economics dept
                       for 7 years before joining the Fed!
                       \_ Obviously smart and probably knows much more about
                          economics than I do. Perhaps not very wise, though.
                       \_ the idea that turning ONE knob in a stereo
                          system to make it sound pleasing to everyone,
                          is ridiculous.
                          \_ huh?
                       \_ Hey, we could have had Harriet Miers.
                       \_ Should he have seen this coming? He sure didn't
                          seem to from his past comments. Not that I'm blaming
                          him per se, since this is really complicated and
                          unpredictable stuff, but I don't feel like any of
                          these guys are sure how this plan is really going
                          to turn out. So it's basically a $700 B hunch/prayer.
                          \_ "Large amounts of risk, particularly
                             credit risk, have become concentrated in
                             the hands of relatively few derivatives
                             dealers, who in addition trade
                             extensively with one other. The troubles
                             of one could quickly infect the others....
                             [leveraged] derivatives severely curtail
                             the ability of regulators to curb
                             leverage and generally get their arms
                             around the risk profiles of banks,
                             insurers and other financial
                             institutions. Similarly, even experienced
                             investors and analysts encounter major
                             problems in analyzing the financial
                             condition of firms that are heavily
                             involved with derivatives contracts.  The
                             derivatives genie is now well out of the
                             bottle, and these instruments will almost
                             certainly multiply in variety and number
                             until some event makes their toxicity
                             clear. Central banks and governments have
                             so far found no effective way to control,
                             or even monitor, the risks posed by these
                             contracts. In my view, derivatives are
                             financial weapons of mass destruction,
                             carrying dangers that, while now latent,
                             are potentially lethal."  --Warren
                             Buffett, 2002
                             [Yes, he should have seen it coming.  -tom]
                             \_ Predictions are all fine and good, and someone
                                is bound to get it right, but I don't think
                                anyone really saw it coming to this extent.
                                \_ Buffett wasn't making a prediction;
                                   he was describing a risk.  A large
                                   portion of his business is managing
                                   risk, and he's very good at it.  He
                                   didn't say "in fall 2007, some
                                   weird activity by hedge funds will
                                   trigger a liquidity crisis which
                                   will eventually cause multiple
                                   major financial institutions to
                                   fail during calendar 2008."  He simply
                                   pointed out that the proliferation of
                                   derivitive contracts in a deregulated
                                   financial market set up a situation where
                                   numerous institutions were taking on
                                   risks they could not measure, and
                                   declaring assets they could not quantify,
                                   and that it was likely that some trigger
                                   event would cause massive problems for
                                   the entire industry.  And it's not like
                                   there wasn't any warning; the LTCM bailout
                                   was a foreshock that was pretty much
                                   ignored.   -tom
                                   \_ He described a risk and predicted it
                                      would cause pain in the industry. I'm
                                      just saying no one really thought it
                                      would cause this much pain. Anyway,
                                      back to the real point -- if the guys
                                      on top didn't clearly see this coming,
                                      then they probably don't clearly see
                                      a way out.
                                      \_ Or more likely, they just didn't care,
                                         since it's "not my problem."
                                         \_ The Invisible Hand will take care
                                            of it.