It was a very strange, extremely political, day. It started with Senator Chris Dodd saying: that Dems and Repubs had "reached a fundamental agreement on a set of principles," By the end of the White House meeting, however, it was obvious that (a) there was no agreement and (b) House Republicans had their own version of a plan which apparently had little to do with the plan that had been discussed up until then. Even before the meeting, Barney Frank accused McCain of , according to the Washington Post, "undermining the [current] proposal and prodding House Republicans to lay out a wholly different approach that is opposed by the White House."

Interesting results from Fairleigh Dickinson University's Public Mind Poll of voters in Delaware and Alaska on whether they think Palin or Biden is more qualified to become President....

Think the Chinese are laughing now? According to a Bloomberg article yesterday, the valiant Hank Paulson (emphasis added):

...told an audience at the Shanghai Futures Exchange that China risked trillions of dollars in lost economic potential unless it freed up its capital markets.

``An open, competitive, and liberalized financial market can effectively allocate scarce resources in a manner that promotes stability and prosperity far better than governmental intervention,'' Paulson said.

I've mentioned before that the political right seems to have a pathological inability to ever admit being wrong, and now we get yet another example: conservatives are determined to pin the housing debacle on Clinton's amendments to the Community Reinvestment Act.

I first got introduced to "Lady de Rothschild" during her interview on Wolf Blitzer's show, as she explained why she was going from being a Hillary supporter to endorsing John McCain. She said so many absurd things that I couldn't help but wonder who the hell she was, where she came from, how she could possibly believe the crap she was spewing (unchallenged) on Blitzer's show, and, of course, what kind of person could slide frictionlessly from ardent support for Clinton to ardent support for McCain. Can you say "Bilderberg?"

Even after his death, J.K. Galbreath remains more prescient and his views more valuable than the current gaggle of lemming economists who have fastened their careers and futures to the coattails of Milton Friedman and the right wing think tanks that made use of him. And could there be a better time to review some of the wisdom Galbreath left behind?

John McCain now claims that he wants to put the clamps on Wall Street speculation and overall dangerous antics. In particular, he now claims he will "reform Wall Street" and that "he's taken on tougher guys than this before." Question: how can he reform it other than by regulating it, and how can he regulate it when all his economic advisors have made anathema to regulation a pillar of their very lives?

When is "spin" really and truly nothing more than a plain old lie? Here's a good example: John McCain first saying that the "fundamentals" of the US economy were "strong," then saying with a straight face that what he meant by fundamentals was worker productivity and entrepreneurial ingenuity.

As one of the "old farts" of the firm, a young person approached me today and asked, "What's causing these banks to go bust?"

I made such a face. "Do you understand how a helicopter can move laterally?"

"No."

I snort. "The helicopter issue is much easier....."

Let us begin as follows, let's go back a few pieces to this one I wrote, which suggested a major bank was going to implode.

I hate being right....!

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