LONDON – Can his fractured fiddle — a million-dollar Guadagnini — be fixed? It’s too early to tell.
David Garrett, a former model who has been called the David Beckham of the classical scene, said he tripped while carrying his 18th century violin as he was leaving London’s Barbican Hall after a performance, smashing it to bits.”
Comment:
What has this to do with the body politic in the US? Everything. Who in his right mind would run down the stairs with a priceless old violin in his hand?
Answer: someone who has insurance. “Irresponsible….that’s what we are….” (Sorry Nat).
The moral hazard problem in a nutshell. Insurance increases the chance that the very behavior it’s calculated to offset will happen.
That’s what this credit crunch is all about. People twiddling, fiddling, and diddling with all sorts of complex instrumentalities they wouldn’t normally dream of getting their tongues around, let alone, put their money into, because they knew someone else – you, dear tax-payer – was always there like the everlasting arms to catch them if they fell down the stairs.
It’s called TBTF — Too Big Too Fail – a theme (with variations) first composed by Alan Greenspan when he fiddled at the Chicago Board, as Bill Engdahl points out.
After that solo performance, he began stringing the economy farther and farther along by tuning interest rates lower and lower.
Yep. They didn’t call him the Maestro for nothing.