Wave of bad economic news rolls off Republicans

[Liberal_in_LA]

Wave of bad economic news rolls off Republicans

http://www.canada.com/edmontonjournal/news/business/story.html?id=8cd65db8-9997-4488-922e-565a590a4e0b

Meanwhile, some well-respected heavyweights and veteran market watchers are doing their best to ring the alarm bells, even if the politicians and the television pundits aren't willing to talk about reality.

Former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker says the U.S. financial system, which has become addicted to fees generated from the "securitization" of risky assets such as subprime mortgages -- rather than traditional bank loans -- is now "broken." "This bright new system, this practice in the United States, this practice in the United Kingdom and elsewhere, has broken down," Volcker told a banking conference in Calgary. "Growth in the economy in this decade will be the slowest of any decade since the Great Depression." Like many market pros, Volcker see more subprime-related bank losses ahead, on top of the more than $500 billion reported to date, as European economies slow and U.S. exports falter.

"It is the most complicated financial crisis I have ever experienced, and I have experienced a few," says Volcker, who ran the Fed from 1979 to 1987.