Bill caught this outstanding article in The Atlantic, authored by former IMF bigwig Simon Johnson, and passed it on to ruin our day.
Here's The Atlantic's lede:
The [economic] crash has laid bare many unpleasant truths about the United States. One of the most alarming, says a former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund, is that the finance industry has effectively captured our government-a state of affairs that more typically describes emerging markets, and is at the center of many emerging-market crises. If the IMF's staff could speak freely about the U.S., it would tell us what it tells all countries in this situation: recovery will fail unless we break the financial oligarchy that is blocking essential reform. And if we are to prevent a true depression, we're running out of time.
The difficulty is that the people who control the financial empire are so inextricably intertwined with our political class that it's almost impossible to separate them.
The article's a little lengthy, but it's very enlightening. Unfortunately, by the time you're finished reading it you'll probably have become a Marxist.
RLC