Was not America founded on the anger generated by the British inequity of (among other things) taxation without representation?

The dependance on social inertia is a shaky position, just ask the Romanovs. Sorry, you can't, can you?

Neither rage nor threats of violence, even when repeatedly carried out, have ever changed the human condition. The communists have been buried. The Romanovs have been sainted.

The way forward is through reason.

To recap, Who you kidding?!?!?!?

When those who are creating the issue are beyond reason, as the adherence to the obscene pay/bonus regime shows, reason is a trap for the reasonable.

Perhaps the anarchists have a point after all.

I agree that there are those who see reason as a trap. For those who do not, and for any who might want to understand what happened (rather than merely looking for scapegoats) over these twelve months or so, the BBC is presenting a thoughtful assessment of the global recession.

In particular, this piece on the downfall of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which almost destroyed the American mortgage market, is a good introduction to one of the financial instruments, securitization, and how these “securities” became “toxic assets.”

As I remember it, the charming custom of Overstatement, an indirect function of greed, was one of the root causes.