David Brooks, ever the sage, speaks truth to panic and calls the shots correctly, particularly his parenthetical comment below, in discussing regulation.
"We’d need regulators who could spot a bubble and squelch a boom just when things seem to be going good, who can scare away foreign investment and who could over-rule popularity-mongering presidents. (The statements by the two candidates this week have been moronic.)
To sum it all up, this supposed new era of federal activism is going to confront some old problems: the lack of information available to government planners, the inability to keep up with or control complex economic systems, the fact that political considerations invariably distort the best laid plans."
I claim no exceptional financial expertise or insight, but an out-of-control, greed and fear driven financial system does not serve our world and country well. A meltdown would be even worse. Neither the President nor Presidential candidates personally have a clue about the intricacies of this mess. Congressional leaders seem equally clueless. Should we expect them to know more?
In any event, Treasury Secretary Paulson and the Fed's Ben Bernanke seem to understand the vast financial morass and its dire implications and are willing to act boldly to salvage it.
When the dust settles, the boards of directors of these failed firms and the chief executives should be forced to suffer financial pain and not be rewarded for this mess. I would also like to know how the curricula of the nation's top business schools will be revamped to teach tomorrow's business leaders how to act differently.
More importantly, I want Congress to tell us how they will revamp their profligate spending habits in order to afford the massive increase in debt and debt service created by this commitment of up to a trillion (Can you say TRILLION?) dollars for bailout services.
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If you don't agree with the bailout, please go to:
http://sanders.senate.gov/comments/ and http://leahy.senate.gov/contact.cfm to tell our senators to vote no to it, in any way, shape, or form. The only way America is going to wake up, is with a shake up.
If you do agree with it, tell them that you do. Democracy is great, isn't it.
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