] On Sept. 9, as it must frequently do, the U.S. government
] turned to Wall Street to raise a little cash, and Paul
] Calvetti bet that demand for $9 billion worth of
] long-term Treasury bonds would be "huge."
]
] But at 1 p.m., as the auction opened and the numbers
] began streaming across his flat-panel screens, the head
] of Treasury trading at Barclays Capital Inc. slumped in
] his chair. Foreign investors, who had been voraciously
] buying Treasury bonds, failed to show up. Bond prices
] cascaded downward, interest rates rose, and in five
] minutes, Calvetti, 38, who makes money by bidding on
] bonds at one price and hoping market demand lets him
] quickly resell them at a profit, had lost $1.5 million.

[ I couldn't even pretend to be an expert on macroeconomics, but the things I am able to understand are really quite scary. It's easy to focus on local issues like tax cuts for the rich and vague handwaving about the national debt during an election. I've been reading a lot more lately that points to serious trouble for our entire economy. I'm not seeing a lot of positive indicators for the US and a lot of disturbing stuff.

Here's another article : http://www.washingtondispatch.com/article_10361.shtml

And God help us if we're already in the midst of the Peak Oil era -- it'll be bad enough if it comes in 30 years. If it's already upon us, we're completely buggered. -k]