[IWE] 'Those whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad'

[Ashton Brown]

A Brit opines. Respondents laud, cavil and festoon the blog, mostly in 
actual English

Willem Buiter -
Professor of European Political Economy, London School of Economics and 
Political Science; former chief economist of the EBRD, former external 
member of the MPC; adviser to international organisations, governments, 
central banks and private financial institutions.
At FT.com (Financial Times)

http://blogs.ft.com/maverecon/2008/09/those-whom-the-gods-would-destroy-they-first-make-mad/


Sample replies:


/[…] British economist much smarter than I pens one of his best ever. He 
thinks we are headed for the Second Great Depression unless — and 
possibly even if […]/


/The Bush Admin. acted in a blind panic in its attempt to circumvent 
Congressional due dilligence by forcing a plan that, by near universal 
opinion, was unlikely to succeed in providing the intended relief, 
failed to protect the taxpayer and was perceived as unjust by most 
Americans.

I am shocked that, after vilifying Congress for uncritically following 
the lead of the Bush Admin. in empowering the President to make war on 
Iraq, the press and pundits now vilifies those in the US Congress who 
have stopped the Bush/Paulson steamroller and are requiring Congress to 
carry out its required due dilligence and listen to the opinions of its 
public. It is unseemly to find you have succombed to this atmosphere of 
intimidation and panic and sided with the perpetrators.
Posted by: Daniel J Aronoff/


/Blimey! The only thing more alarming than Willem Buiter’s blog is the 
torrent of abuse heaped on him in these comments. A huge and painful 
learning curve evidently lies ahead even for many FT Internet page 
readers. And WB no doubt feels that his headline was even more widely 
applicable than he originally supposed.

The rest of us who want to try and map out the way ahead in our finances 
and our lives can thank him for giving us the most explicit reaction so 
far to this ludicrous action by the US Congress
Posted by: David B/


=================================================================================================


I note that several of seeming perspicuity have observed (elsewhere) that:

The Fed is not the proper Authority for dealing with such major surgery 
to the financial system.
(In this case: Questions of the entire credit subsystem; that altogether 
subsumed within the even larger Questions re. 'solvency'. Not to mention 
transparency vs. intentional opacity (as ploy). And all this within the 
chaos of unrecorded/un-'registered' phony paper in the $many-T range 
afloat out there.) Or, as Bill Maher says, /New Rules!/

So then, what if it IS the Right Thing for Congress to--not supplement 
but--supersede the Admin's Hail Mary cobbled-together Panic Bill?
(Quicky. Enough, of course.)

'Course if most congresscritters are as Econ-competent as McC admits he 
is Not: they will have to select the flavor of Economists they want to 
listen to; still: it's Their Job, no?