The Levee

Liberals appear to be concerned that the Geithner plan will result in the people who wrecked finance finding themselves rewarded for the wrecking. This, I'll suggest, is the plan's principal aim. The euphemism of "risk" is indicative of the accuracy of my reading. Baby fall down, go boom. Mommy lift baby back up. Economic dislocation has so far been not nearly prolonged or severe enough for the ruling class to do otherwise. A quiescent public poses no threat, and the GOP opposition is playing its role nicely, acting with such unceasing lunacy that anything Obama proposes seems the epitome of reasonableness and rationality in comparison. Grampappy Floodpants Falsetto Frownsalot, AKA Candidate-in-Exile John McCain, and the rest of the absurdist choir make delicious nonsense by proposing that a naked sop to the poor, poor fortunes of our rich, rich banksters is Leninism, decrying always-popular federal spending on local projects, and claiming that unemployment insurance is Treason. Against this even the sallow, foppish, out-of-his-depth SecTres seems a paragon of virtuous intellect.

As noted yesterday, I doubt the plan will succeed even on its own terms, let alone that the economy will be all peaches and bundles of cash by early next year, although the ability of our Accounts Overlords in Government to manipulate Wall Street's regnant innumerates with confidence game pronouncements may yet get the Dow back into 8-9,000 territory . . . briefly. To use a metaphor currently popular, we appear to be witnessing our officials breathing a sigh of relief that the hurricane didn't directly hit the city.