Alan Greenspan was the guy who told Ronald Reagan to rob Social Security to cover his tax cut's for the wealthy leading to some saying SS will be broken in a few year's.Thanks Greenspan for another decision that turn's out to be a disaster.

Of course, the know-it-alls forget to tell you that there is no such animal as free-market global capitalism. Governments in Japan, China, Russia, and elswhere have been propping up so-called capitalistic ventures for decades now. How does anyone think Japan was able to flood us with cheap imports the first two years of Reagan's adminsitration (and triple our trade decifict!) without his support and Japan's government?

So, if it's dead. Then good. I'm glad it's dead.

It's ignorant to equate the various mechanisms we have with the concept of capitalism.

We here in the US have a Federal Reserve System, and a Fannie Mac and a Ginnie Mae and a Ginnie Mac, and a Securities and Exchange Commission. The Federal Home Loan Banks. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. I have some idea of what some of these organizations do, but I think it would still be accurate to say I really don't know what the hell they're about.

We have a Department of the Treasury, which is in charge of the government's money. But it also seems to be in charge of all US money - it prints it, and it regulates all the banks. I wonder if all of those responsibilities should lie within the same organization.

What I can say for certain is that they are vastly powerful forces invented and operated by a vastly powerful central authority, the US federal government. (That's the same organization that collected about $2.5 TRILLION in taxes last year, and somehow managed to spend over $2.8 TRILLION of it.)

We have federal bailouts and trading limits and an official Prime Rate and again, I really don't know what the hell these things are about. We have a single currency, and laws against competing with it.

All inventions of the US federal government. I might add that all of them (besides the Treasury) were invented long after the establishment of the the United States, generally in response to crises like the Civil War, the panic of 1907, and the Great Depression.

Then let's just note that there is an international system of finance, and I really don't know what the hell that is.

So what is capitalism? The SEC and the IRS and the Reserve and the Prime Rate and the dollar vs. the euro vs. the baht?

No.

Capitalism is a system in which people can trade goods and services freely.

Social security might not be in stocks, but most people's 401Ks are. Lets face facts, with the rising cost of fuel and food, retirees need far more than the paltry SS cheques.

Few companies offer pensions, and for my generation SS will probably be a fuzzy memory by the time I'm retirement age (an age which seems to keep getting pushed up, funnily enough). All I'll have is a 401K (and my Australian superannuation... same thing as a 401K).

So, yeah, stock crashes aren't so good for the shuffle-board set either. Especially if they were planning on living off something other than baked beans in a can for the next year.

And may someone please drive a wooden stake through its heart to make doubly sure. Mr. Greenspan's tenure also coincides with one of the worst increases in the gap between rich and poor.

About the only good thing about Global "Free" Market Capitalism is that, having left its destructive wake all over the Third World, it has inspired many to start overthrowing it. We can see this effect in full bloom in South America, with Argentina giving the World Bank the heave-ho being one of the most satisfying.

The 9 years in the comparison begins at the top of the dot com bubble and ends 6-8 months in to a downturn that's well on the way to becomming a recession. To be fair you really need to compare stock prices in March 2001 with prices now. Of course things are going to get worse before they get better so maybe at April 2009 we'll still be at 138 on Standard and Poor and it really will be a 10 year loss.

If you look at stock market behaviour from the late 19th century up until today, this sort of flat trading is normal. When I was taking an investment course recently, the first thing the instructor pulled out was a chart - I can't remember which index - of the last 134 years. During 100 of those years, the market was bouncing up and down within a range, this period of "flat" trading usually lasted 20-30 years, and was followed by rapid upward movement. The longest upward trend was the one that ended with the dot-com bust, so it would make sense to expect another 10-20 years of flat trading now.

The lesson? Just buying into indexes is not a good investment. You actually have to pick companies that are going to outperform the market. And don't hang on through the downturns...preserve your capital or sell short, and buy back in when things start to turn for the better.

At the end of your article, is that consumer confidence is being measured at record lows. That is also a harbinger of very bad things to come.

In fact, it doesn't seem bad at all.

Here is a chart of the S&P 500 over history:

http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=%5EGSPC&t=my

And look at that on a linear scale:

http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?s=%5EGSPC&t=my&l=off&z=m&q=l&c=

If I connect a line from 1987 when Greenspan took office, to 2005, or to now, the upward path seems pretty clear.

Market performance from 1995-2000 was literally unprecedented, and it warps decade to decade statistics.

Obviously y'all don't actually know anything about Greenspan beyond hearsay.

You know what they say about hearsay? It doesn't count in a court of law.

So if you're going to make your case, try including a verifiable fact or two.