ny times article on the mess that-is u.s. banking

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/04/opinion/04lewiseinhorn.html

peter schiff on cnbc

another great discussion on what caused great depression and how to get out of current disaster.

supporting article:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123033898448336541.html

biggest gov’t ‘public works’ project in US history

too bad we couldn’t have spent this money on actual “things” or “stuff”. Or even better, maybe its really like getting out of college with lots of student loan debt, except that you don’t graduate and are dumber than when you started….

great visual explanation of financial meltdown

from The Big Picture

bailout for home construction industry???

perfect – let’s inflate yet another hollow housing bubble by building fannie/freddie on steriods.

Excerpt:

Everyone is coming to Washington with their hands out these days, and the home builders are no exception. The builders are pitching Congress on a two-hundred-and-fifty-billion-dollar stimulus package designed to lower mortgage rates (via federal subsidy) and encourage home buying (via a tax credit). Until home prices stabilize, they argue, there’s no way for the financial markets really to settle down.

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/jamessurowiecki/2008/11/do-we-really-ne.html

great debate on fate of auto bailout / bankruptcy

part 1

part 2

peter schiff does impromptu lecture for cnbc kids

world leaders get last laugh

george will says let detroit go bankrupt

read this today…scathing article by george will on auto industry…he recommends bankruptcy then a merger/restructuring of remaining carnage…kind of similar to what bill ackman recommends (link to his bil moyers interview here)

Link to article:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/11/17/AR2008111703101.html

plunge protection team

came across the concept of the ‘plunge protection team’ this morning on one of the ron paul rss feeds i follow…basically, the theory is that the gov’t is stepping into the stock market and buying to keep one-day losses from being ‘catastrophic’….its viewed as a conspiracy theory but here’s a crazy clip of this being discussed today on air on CNBC…you can tell the anchors are uneasy about the subject.