We've been through a lot of this before.

I'm happy that the banking system was rescued. And actually I'm happy that Mr. Pitts didn't make out like a bandit on his shorts.

I think the Fed should be doing more now to get the banks to clean up their balance sheets, reign in the incentives that banks and big financial systems have to drive the economy into a ditch, increase reserve requirements, etc., etc., but a lot of these things have to be phased in gradually.

I'm not terribly upset that the banks are making 3% for no risk. Some of that sleight of hand seems to be necessary right now.

I'm more upset about the Fed not doing more to address the first third of its mandate: "maximum employment, stable prices, and moderate long-term interest rates."

YMMV.

Government could have just sold that many treasuries and give each of us the payers of that money the 75k worth that we all now owe the banks.


Um, the Treasury bill auctions are open. The banks that got bailed out weren't the only ones that were bidding. Anyone with the cash can bid, AFAIK.

Giving each American $75k would have done little if anything to fix the problems. The bailouts bought the system time to work things out - a lot of the problems are still there, under the surface...

Cheers,
Scott.