Okay, so, today's Times byline orgy re-enactment of that coupla days a coupla weeks ago where suddenly every banker was like "OHSHTWRSCRWD" achieved two important things:

1. Reminded "Main Street" (Aside: irk you as much as it does yours true that the pols keep calling it "Main Street" when the whole reason this started is because there's NO SUCH THING anymore in this country?? Because everyone had to have his own house, recall?? Anyhoo) that, you know, every business in this freakin country operates on debt, not because they're spoiled delusional children like every last CEO on the Street except John Thain (which reminds me, Johnny Boy is staying on with the new Bank of AMerillca! See, you KNEW he wasn't in it for the nine figure pay package, aw…) but because DUH, because that's like the basis of all civilization or something!! And

2. Reminded Wall Street Just How Crazy it is with a creepy/inspiring (which? both?) anecdote about Black Thursday over at Goldisachs. Lloyd was freaking out, Goldman stock in freefall, etc. etc.…and then one o'clock rolls around and someone they identify as a "prankster" starts playing the "Star-Spangled Banner" over the loudspeaker. All the bankers are like, what?! Some even put their hands over their hearts. And at THAT VERY MOMENT, the stock stopped falling. Turned up a little even! Guess what had happened? That's right, a short-selling ban had just been announced!! Capitalism itself had been suspended! Think that means there's something Goldman guys find inspiring about this country… other than its free market?? Yeah probably not, but I thought about shedding a tear!

Okay so moving on, the big story is…well shucks, got a few hours? No of course not! We're all about to hit me baby one more time with another public appearance by everyone's fave fakenbaked ratings black gold governess!!! (Broad is like Merrill with the CDOs after even AIG stopped insuring them, we know she's bad for us, but we just can't stop.) So I'll make it quick: everyone, except maybe Buffett and John not to be confused with Hank Paulson, is screwed: every other hedge fund is screwed, Veronica Peterson of Columbia, Maryland, who is trying to pay a $4,450-a-month mortgage on fifty grand a year — hey, why not have a go at that, quant jocks? — is screweder, the market that is being artificially propped up by the continued short sale ban managed to fall 350 points today anyway, not that anyone is paying attention to the market because the entire private sector is too busy wondering where the heck they're supposed to find a line of credit when the entire financial system won't trust anyone but the guv-mint with its money anymore. Yikes! Oh, though if Veronica Peterson's story shook your faith in private enterprise, here's a doozy from the public sector: there's a special provision in the new bailout bill offering (SORELY-needed) tax relief to the makers of wooden arrows used in bow-n-arrow sets for children. Think you could poke someone's life out with one of them things?

Anyway, if I were really Serwer this is where I would actually round up a few MORE asides and tangents here and call them "Loose Change," but in the Web 2.0 era that gets to be your job! Although if Dismal Science wants offer himself for the position of Serwer's old standby source "Deep Blue" (sug. nickname change: "Deep Shit") he knows who to G-chat!

• Stocks recovered from their Monday crash, but seriously, no one cared because the SEC's ban on haters is still on, oh look it was just extended until October 17 and anyway all anyone cares about is something called a TED spread, which represents the difference between the yield on Treasury bonds and the yield a bank can make by lending another bank money overnight and is really wide because investors are worried that at some point the Treasury Department will have to stop seizing banks that can't pay it back.
• Warren Buffett invested three more billions. This time in GE.
• That is because, hey, guess what, the "real economy" needs to borrow money to survive, hello, that is why finance was invented to begin with did you think they would do it just to piss me off? Anyway suddenly no one — not even GE! Or for that matter AT&T or the government of Florida! — could do that.
• Thank god Zionist casino magnate Sheldon Adelson is a billionaire casino magnate because he lent a few hundred million dollars to his Vegas casinos so they could pay the interest payments on some of those delightful money pits he borrowed all that money to build so he could own the stock that would make him a billionaire. The rest of Vegas is probably screwed for awhile though.
• Housing prices and auto sales both fell 16% for the month of September.
• Former Lehman Brothers CEO Dick Fuld was banished from his old office and Daily Intel made a funny graphic and Europe is very mad about some $8 billion wire transfer he made the night before the bankruptcy.
• Harvard Business School canceled the Predator's Ball.
• A bunch of provisions were added to the old bill, including "a measure that would require health insurers to treat mental health issues the same way they treat physical illnesses." See, psychiatric meds are very important in reminding the nation to pay its bills on time, I would know! Seriously though, what fucking liquidity purpose does t