Finally things got interesting. I think I am starting to lose all interest in the stock market as it becomes apparent that the rules governing the game change whenever necessary to protect the wealthy, even if this happens at the expense of the poor. So venture capitalist who should be on the more sophisticated end of capitalism get bailed out because they kept lots of uninsured money with a bank that was taking risky bets after the bank lobbied the government for the right to take risky bets. Ok, equity and bond holder will get wiped out, maybe that’s a start, and of course you want to protect against a bank run….if this bailout actually accomplished that, we’ll see.

Now the talking heads on Bloomberg and CNBC are clamoring for the Fed to pause or even cut rates, because driving up enemployment which will have real consequences like lost jobs, suicides, kids worried about where mom and dad will get rent money, no, because banks engaged in risky behavior got caught sideways in the Fed’s very well telegraphed rate hikes. So when wheat prices rise and a baker has contracts to deliver bread to supermarkets at a certain price goes out of business, should the Fed and Treasury rush in to save that business? Does every business that gets caught in market moves deserve to be bailed out in this, “you’re all winner” society?

We’ve choosen capitalism and money as our god and like all faiths this one requires a certain ideology. In this case, instead of sacrificing goats or pouring wine and olive oil over temples, we punish the incompetent by having their assets end up in the hands of the competent. Because we are (or were) halfway civilized, we didn’t kill or imprison those incompetent fools, instead they just lost their money and had tpo start over, wiser and maybe more cautious, or at least that was the deal we made with our god. But now, the incompetent wealthy get bailed out often at the expense of the helpless poor. Hard to see the moral or logical basis for this religion anymore.