It makes sense to bail out a boat that's leaking, but not one that's sinking

This makes me borderline nuts:

U.S. Is Said Set to Offer A.I.G. Up to $30 Billion More

The sooner we kill (or let die, cuz I'm benevolent) AIG, Citi, BoA et al, the very much the better. But alas, we keep on keeping on, as if the world has not changed. Another $30B down the tubes and soon to end up in the Hamptons via off-shore accounts in the Bahamas...

Much as I like (love) Obama for his real courage in addressing our horrific mess bluntly and head on (an honest budget! the cost of war included!!, who coulda thunk?), thus far the best of his efforts at dealing with the banking crisis are merely oratorical, alas. If not outright dangerous in their opacity. Things are real, dangerous, and bluntly so


Let's peek at Martin Wolf's increasingly urgent concerns:

Here: Japan’s lessons for a world of balance-sheet deflation

And here: What Obama should tell leaders of the Group of 20

And here: Why Obama’s new Tarp will fail to rescue the banks

Do you sense a theme from Martin? Like this?:

The London summit of 1933 marked the moment at which co-operative efforts to manage the Great Depression collapsed. The summit of the Group of 20 countries, in the same city, on April 2, must turn out quite differently. That may seem a simple task. It is not. The usual platitudinous communiqué would be a catastrophe.
The world now needs change it can believe in.

Only Barack Obama, the US president, can provide the desired leadership: he is untainted, popular and leader of the country that, for good and ill, remains central.

"Catastrophe" sayeth Mr Wolf

Among other things, imho, Obama needs to get much, much tougher on the banks who are killing us, and who have created this crisis. Let em die. Let em go bankrupt. Let em be nationalized. If he does not do this, the mess will indeed become much WTE....

This weekend's disaster in the EU is anything but a good sign, and is evidence of a complete absence of global leadership