A Republic, If You Can Keep It:

News Item: Texas oil billionaire T. Boone Pickens to visit Chicago today to promote his energy independence plan.

News Headline: "Wall Street's worst week ever."

An editor of National Review Online at www.nationalreview.com, on Barack Obama pronouncing "Pakistan" correctly:

News Item: "A South African man has broken the world record for living with venomous snakes . . ."

QT Trickle-On Economics Update:

QT Early Warning System:

News Item: ''A Wall Street executive has left Manhattan to become a monk in a Bulgarian monastery.''

From FactCheck.org:

News Item: ". . . The bailout bill, which in its original form stood at three pages and is now at over 400 pages, has been filled with earmarks . . ."

News Item: ". . . Wall Street salaries and bonuses and the public opulence of wealthy CEOs . . . taxpayer money going to the same executives who caused the . . . calling the bailout 'extortion' and 'corporate welfare' . . ."

A McCain-Palin campaign spokesman blaming House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for the House's failure to pass the Wall Street bailout bill as the stock market fell nearly 800 points:

News Item: Wall Street's five largest firms pay more than $3 billion to top executives over five years while they preside over loans that help bring down the investment-banking system.

QT Internet Words of the Week (Thomas Jefferson at www.kgbreport.com:

News Item: ". . . The poll asked voters which presidential candidate they would rather watch a football game with . . ."

News Item: "A faltering U.S .economy slowed the flow of immigrants into the United States dramatically last year . . ."

News Item: ". . . Wall Street crisis . . . federal government steps in . . . taxpayers left holding the . . . understand the complexities of the economic system . . ."

Has everyone had enough of National Humor in Business Month?

Department of How Could Anyone Possibly Have Seen It Coming:

News Headline (1999): ''Financial services industry on road to deregulation.''

News Headline: "Nepal closes nude disco."