A Troubling Thought...

While keeping myself fairly informed on the situation given my general curiosity towards economics, I have generally not been concerned with the economic turmoil facing the country.  That has mostly been because of the single selfish viewpoint that as long as I am still employed and earning money I can wait out everything occurring to my investments and retirement accounts.

Something just troubled me, and it won't trouble me for long but it's still unsettling enough to document.  Even though I have a bank account that shows a balance, that money has been spent by someone.  Every bank right now is for the most part insolvent (the loans it made with my money are not expected to be repaid meaning the money is gone).  The government has promised that it would print more money but that's not very satisfying.  The government is trying to hide the fact that it's printing money by instead concocting a crazy program where hedge funds will buy these loans at inflated prices from banks.  The hedge funds get most of their money from the government (printing money) and the hedge funds are profiting more through transaction fees than the hope of these assets ever making a profit.  It's all a way to follow the accounting rules that at this point seem irrelevant.  The reason I'd prefer nationalization is because then everything would be transparent.  Instead of closed door meeting the government could just fess up that it's holding a bunch of crappy mortgages and would print money that I earned at some point and may have been lost in the shuffle.  The best answer in my opinion is still the tough answer, and that's the one that no president has the balls to deliver.  Instead we are spoon-fed the answer that the situation is difficult but manageable and everything will be fine.  Thanks, but maybe I'm fine with things being crappy for people so they can get a dose of something that's actually good for them, not just something that tastes good.  Eat your damn vegetables!