The reasons for the Global Financial PANIC 2007

I've posted a long and cumbersome article by John Mauldin on my blog with my citizen grassrootz media critiZism/jounalism, like a call response. I simply cannot post the whole thing on OpEd News - it's not the modern equivalent of Atlantic Monthly in 1929 and I am not that kind of "writer"; I'm a BLOGGER!! But my form of journalism is meant to be around for TODAY, so I am taking the time to post notice of it's appearance in the hopes you'll go to my blog and read it in it's entirety. You can come right back and leave comment here if you care to!! I'd surely like that.

Taking shots at Mauldin's imprecise and peculiar rationale, long as it is, provides ample opportunity to illustrate what is wrong with perusing the American media for insight into the current global financial meltdown. It doesn't really have the time or space to look at all the fascinating minutae that develops in an opera this big. As my building rant proceeds, I get a right snarky attitude and begin sniping at John's lunacy a whole bunch more broadly. Gamblers are a sneaky breed and he's no exception.

I am taking "the liberty" - as is my wont as a one of the new breed of grassrootz journalists- to *snip* at will otherwise you'll lose it - but that said I just couldn't do much to *snip* at all except to add my Pilgrim's Progress morality lessons after certain paragraphs. IF, I had a webcam perhaps I could illustrate this on youtube, but the linkz game is what I am good at.

Sadly, in 2007 there are no messiahs.

Explore the complex reasons why with me ...

As a form of noncomedic relief, I felt it instructive to get comment from those who had a Major Role in bringing it all about on the Greed Side, as well as links to those who saw it coming and shed light on the Fear Side .

There is a Commercial Break and an Intermission.

Mauldin's article has been written for investors and is a bit a bit trippy, and my comments will make reading him all the trippier. But that's the task I undertook, to just just follow along and deconstruct. I have insisted on some form of linguistic purity, and thus you are free to read links on the usage of certain words he uses and words that I use. Most of those links bear the marks of a VERY dry sense of humor honed in the UK once upon a time. It's my form of artistic license in the age of internet 'journalism". Specific care has been used to ensure few links are from "old" sources of information.

Most links you will not have time to see and/or probably have not had or taken the time to find. Perhaps, and that's the intent, you will use some of these sources of information I'm providing in the future, as this story has 'legs'

At least, as days pass by and you grow CURIOUSER you'll know where to find them. I presume that most know nothing, but want to know.

For most of you wiseacres and potential pundits who drop by here for your daily dose of information, I assure you I have faith that you have a brain with working cells, unlike some bankers and politicos I have met. I assume you have a bit of time on your hands, too!

I've left in his links, put in MANY other relevant one; Mauldin's charts are instructive.  My comments are meant to be totally informative while held together by moral considerations. All bolds in his text are MINE, put in ORANGE and intensified when I so pleased. Comments by me are in PURPLE.

Links grow exponentially as you read on, for Good Reason. This is TRULY the modern day Pilgrim's Progress tale, morphed into an opera in multiple multiple Acts to follow the past two weeks' gory details. If you are bored, you can always go back to the Fear Channel at CNN and grab your bowl of popcorn, while you can still afford it. They won't let you in on much! but it will help you avoid the growing consternation most of us who expected this are experiencing!!

Inflation, an unasked-for gift from the Federal Reserve Bank, will be eating up your food dollars, but hard to make the call just when it will take you several hours, a wheelbarrow and your new Amero coins to buy what was once thought to be an affordable daily treat. PaPaPa POP! corn.  

Your Wealthy Uncle will be still be eating at a five-star hotel, however, enjoying whatever his itty-bitty heart desires if he economically survives this Big One. The crisis has been carefully staged for his benefit, imho, if he put His Faith in the transglobal economy ahead of time!!

And for editorial slant, I am not interested in seeing the PANIC bailed out and I am not the person to make sense of it all. But it's high time for people to wake up! and see HOW they got SET UP is my contention. As a person on a fixed income, my heart goes out to ALL PENSIONERS and those to come in the Baby Boom Bulge .. every single one WORLD WIDE; the evidence shows that the pension funds have been selected to be the next patsies. This the next grouping to be smashed by increasing globalization and a sense that Armageddon is here now.

Will we soon, as the hedgers hope, maybe, just maybe, see some real leadership will rise to the top? Can the same old spinners and shills show us the way through the financial gloom? Or can the New Man produce another Lech Wallesa Type when we need a person like that? Our young Christian's cry for this is only part of the old myth that has to go.

Well, no single MAN is going to bail this out, no matter how much we need a messiah. That man is definitely NOT Warren Buffet. The pension funds of our NEIGHBORS are the new target of a program to SAVE THE RICH and their very poor judgment. Or is it ...?

I've included links to show you why Buffet is a poor bet, but left Volcker off the hook for the minute. Why? It's a day-to-day news story and he hasn't entered the stage yet in this financial opera ... but the Slough of Despond can become a reference point to you all. The last "bubble", in the high tech industry, borrowed this phrase widely ...

This, then, is today's whining whine of the Supremo hedge fund consultant, John Mauldin on the Blogsphere Stage.

"Oh! Woe!" the Tenor sings as he marches off to vacation.

As our curtain goes up, the market is further collapsing and Tenor Mauldin awaits the Baritone who he hope shall arrive, bearing the swords of revenge against a market that just doesn't understand what clever boys the yuppies have been .... what True Believers they have been in the orthodox church of the True Church of CorporatISM. Where is the JUSTICE and MERCY of their oncoming bankruptcies ...?

A copy of the Banker's Manifesto can be read by pushing the link.

Perhaps next week, I'll switch to our modern interpretation of the spiritual quest, Slaugherhouse Five, to explain our collective further woes. For as he says,

"there is nothing intelligent to say about a massacre."
~ Kurt Vonnegut, d. 2006

Virginia

August 18, 2007 The Panic of 2007 by John Mauldin	.
End of the World or Muddle Through? This week I try to explain in simple terms the very complicated story of how we went from some bad mortgage loan practices in the US to the point of world credit markets freezing up. There is a connection between the retirement plans of Mr. and Mrs. Watanabe in Japan and the subprime problems of Mr. and Mrs. Smith in California. We find the relationship between European banks and problematic hedge funds. And finally, we try and see how we get out of this mess. Oddly, I think it is hedge funds (and maybe Warren Buffett) to the rescue, but not in the way you would think. It is a lot to cover, so let's jump right in. *snip* Again, read more HERE. And write me when you have your rant together. I've done my bit for the week. Virginia