In his extensive year in review blog, Dr. Collum puts in an enormous amount of thought, effort, articulation, and…best of all…charts-

On the other end of the spectrum, we have this gem from CNBC- “A reason for hope- back-to-back down years for the stock market are rare“.  The entire argument can be found inside the title.

This, by the way, is how I became a permabear (and goldbug) in the first place.  In the earliest part of my adult life, I bought stocks, just like everybody else.  But as I read more articles from ALL points of view, the bear side just made so much more sense.  More than an entire generation of papering over one financial crisis after another has, ironically, had the effect of giving people MORE confidence in our broken system- after all, if any problem can be “solved” by sweeping it under the rug, who’s to say we can’t continue down that path indefinitely?  (Interestingly enough, this reasoning does not fly with the public when it comes to environmentalism.  Well…at least, not when it comes to discussing environmentalism- implementation is another story altogether.)

The question is, can The Powers That Be paper over the next (and apparently, impending) financial crisis?  We’ll find out soon enough…