You're welcome. :) I have seen lots of sturm und drang over the financial crisis, the bailout, the housing market but I hadn't seen any real understanding or attempt to explain the crisis so that someone who is intelligent but never gave a thought to global or national financial systems can wrap their brains around why solving the problem is so crucial. As Biden rightly pointed out (gotta get my daily political shot in), you can't solve a problem if you don't understand the causes.

I've had a similar gut reaction, particularly watching house values and the amount of consumerism around me. I couldn't figure out where all of this money was coming from but it was obvious that I'd missed out on some secret in life. That is, until I started shopping for a house; the deals people pitched were insane -- and virtually every one of the formerly modest houses in my own neighborhood had been refinanced to renovate it with granite counters, luxurious bathrooms, exotic woods, custom lighting, top of the line appliances...money was everywhere.

I wasn't surprised by the mortgage meltdown -- but I had no idea that a whole new financial system had grown up to provide these mortgages and how that was destined to bring down Lehman Brothers, Bear Stearns, AIG, and on and on.

I feel as if I now understand Katie Couric's question to Palin about why not funnel the $700 billion to the troubled mortgage industry to help "the people" rather than helping Wall Street banks.