How to stay out of the fetal position

So I remember the first time I heard about Thomas Friedman. My father had just read ,"The Lexus and the Olive Tree', Friedman's book on globalization, which he thought was a very important book to come out that year. He explained Friedman's ideas over thanksgiving day appetizers and I cataloged it in my head with all the other books he told me to read, most of which I haven't. At the time I was working with metal bands and didn't have time to think about the rest of the world. Fast forward to now and I still haven't read any of his books, his views on the world are still important and I do read him sometimes in the New York Times.

Today I did read what Thomas Friedman had to say about the bailout in this op-ed piece . I agree that, "The story cannot end here. If it does, assume the fetal position.".

Bailout #2

Here is a link to a op-ed piece in the New York Times yesterday. Mmmm grrr.

Bailout questions?

I was reading a article on MSNBC this morning about the financial crisis after having a conversation with my wife last night about the failure of the government for not being able to come to an agreement on the bailout. After our conversation, I realized I don't really have a good grasp on what the government is trying to do. I did know I felt betrayed by the people who we the people had voted into office to make these hard decision for us. One quote that caught my eye was, “This is really a failure, at a massive level, of the political system,” ( Mark Gertler, an economics professor at New York University). Another professor goes on to say that one of the problems is that no one has really gone out and explained what the bailout is doing and why we need it. I had to agree with much of what was said in the article. I don't know much about my own finances, much less those of the entire country.

So I went to the House Financial Services Committee's page on the "Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008". It helped me understand a little more about the bailout plan. I thought I would post these links so others might be able to read what the government was discussing straight from the horse's mouth.