re: "Oh, and meanwhile: Home prices fell again, sharply."

Good. They need to fall. The idea that there should be some (certainly vain) effort to prop up hyperinflated home prices is preposterous. Home values only rose to the level that they did by virtue of a giant Ponzi scheme. Trying to prop up the results of that scheme is idiotic.

Insofar as the now-constant media barrage that tells us that "congress acted irresponsibly" by not handing Paulson a trillion bucks, this, too, is preposterous. In addition to putting unConstitutional power into the Sec Treasury's hands, no one -- including Paulson -- can guarantee you that it would work! Indeed as you point out in your article, "The Fed injected another $300 billion into markets on Monday hoping to loosen things up, and appears to have failed completely. So the answer is clearly not throwing even more money down the rat hole.

“It’s our view that this package, in a fundamental sense, will not solve the problem,” said Simon Johnson, a former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund. Mr. Johnson said that he had been hoping that the bailout plan would simply stabilize the markets through the presidential elections in November, but that he was now pessimistic about even that.

Michael Darda, chief economist at MKM Partners, an investment firm in Greenwich, Conn., said the Treasury’s bailout plan might have even unnerved many investors. “I don’t see how it can help banks unless it’s clear that the government is going to buy these assets for substantially more than they are worth right now,” Mr. Darda said. “It’s such a big step in terms of government influencing the private sector, and it’s hard for investors to take a leap like that overnight, especially when they don’t know what’s going on.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/30/business/30plan.html?hp

"It is obvious that the current financial crisis is becoming more severe in spite of the Treasury rescue plan (or maybe because of it as this plan is totally flawed)

-Nouriel Roubini

http://tinyurl.com/46r24u

“It’s our view that this package, in a fundamental sense, will not solve the problem,” said Simon Johnson, a former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund. Mr. Johnson said that he had been hoping that the bailout plan would simply stabilize the markets through the presidential elections in November, but that he was now pessimistic about even that.

Michael Darda, chief economist at MKM Partners, an investment firm in Greenwich, Conn., said the Treasury’s bailout plan might have even unnerved many investors. “I don’t see how it can help banks unless it’s clear that the government is going to buy these assets for substantially more than they are worth right now,” Mr. Darda said. “It’s such a big step in terms of government influencing the private sector, and it’s hard for investors to take a leap like that overnight, especially when they don’t know what’s going on.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/30/business/30plan.html?hp

"It is obvious that the current financial crisis is becoming more severe in spite of the Treasury rescue plan (or maybe because of it as this plan is totally flawed)

-Nouriel Roubini

http://tinyurl.com/46r24u

“It’s our view that this package, in a fundamental sense, will not solve the problem,” said Simon Johnson, a former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund. Mr. Johnson said that he had been hoping that the bailout plan would simply stabilize the markets through the presidential elections in November, but that he was now pessimistic about even that.

Michael Darda, chief economist at MKM Partners, an investment firm in Greenwich, Conn., said the Treasury’s bailout plan might have even unnerved many investors. “I don’t see how it can help banks unless it’s clear that the government is going to buy these assets for substantially more than they are worth right now,” Mr. Darda said. “It’s such a big step in terms of government influencing the private sector, and it’s hard for investors to take a leap like that overnight, especially when they don’t know what’s going on.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/30/business/30plan.html?hp

"It is obvious that the current financial crisis is becoming more severe in spite of the Treasury rescue plan (or maybe because of it as this plan is totally flawed)

-Nouriel Roubini

http://tinyurl.com/46r24u