The Simple Accountant

Second Round of Massive Deleveraging About to Hit U.S. Banking System?

There is little support for what seems to me to be the author's excessively bearish view on the banks. Certainly the situation warrants investor caution, but to some extent that is almost always the case.

Even in a fairly dire scenario, there is no reason for a run on any of the major banks, just as there wasn't in the Lehmann case. That was a policy failure. See for example Elizabeth Warren's discussion on this matter in the recently aired PBS Frontline documentary, and her interview on the program's website.

Turning Japanese: The Audacity of Reality (Part 3 of 3)

Very good analysis, for the most part, though some points are debatable, particularly the anti-SEC bits. Yes, they failed to do their job, but that doesn't preclude them from shaping up and getting on with it.

In terms of stimulus, we could look at the country as if it were a business firm. Parts of its capital stock are depleted and could benefit from being refurbished. This means that investment in growth producing capital goods is the order of the day. Spending for its own sake, as you point out, is part of the problem rather than the solution.

The important distinction that one hopes (I have little confidence) the authorities will keep in mind, is the difference between spending and investment. The "projects" detailed in the essay are too much of the former and too little of the latter.