You're supposed to raise your standard of living by working harder, being clever, earning more income -- not by using your long-term savings. And now this current generation is pretty much fucked. When push comes to shove and they go to take money out of their houses at retirement time, they’re going to find out that there ain’t a whole lot there. They better pray that Social Security is still around in 20 years -– not exactly a sure thing.

There is the other shoe. I hadn't considered that. These people won't be able to retire! Millions of them, across the social strata. They'll have a huge house and a BMW and no retirement savings. They'll all be depending on Social Security at exactly the moment when Social Security becomes insolvent.

This essay makes another interesting point:

But you look at what FEMA did after Katrina, and you wonder, "Who’s running the ship?" This disaster is more of the same -- only it is much, much worse than New Orleans.

We saw a complete abdication of responsibility by the regulatory supervisors who oversee banking and lending institutions.

Basically, we've got more incompetent Bush Administration appointees. This is beginning, for me, to be a core reason why I don't think I'll be able to vote for McCain no matter what I think of his policy positions vis-a-vis the Democratic nominee -- its still the Republican party, and the Republican party appears to be completely infested with rubes who can't do their jobs. This keeps coming up in context after context. Unfortunately, only Hillary seems to have made an issue out of it, and ironically so as she is perceived as being part of the culture of corruption too.

Don't Fear the Bear - Barry Ritholtz - Esquire