As they say, when a bank loans a man a hundred grand, the bank owns him. When the bank lends a corporation or limited liability partnership a billion dollars, they own the bank.

One thing that that Bear Sterns example shows is that the fundamental justification for capitalist security holders taking increasingly huge shares of the productivity/profit pie (as opposed to the other half of the economic equation, labor, or as I think of it, you and me), is that they take RISKS.

Yup, real risky to invest in high yield hedge funds for the gains while secretly safety netted with more capital from sources that can't afford for you to fail. Capital investment, after you get to a certain level, is about the most unrisky thing out there. Less risk than taking the bus to work, by and large. So why do they get such a big piece of the pie?

Safety nets are grand. Someday, us folks need to get us some, too. Like the millionaire speculators.

Doodham, your post, like the original article makes no sense. You seem to have no understanding of who owned what to whom here.

Let's review the winners and losers in this transaction:

One set of losers are all of the equity investors in the hedge funds (or the "rich speculators" in your terms). They hoped to continue to get 20%+ annual returns. They have been wiped out as the value of the hedge funds assets are less than the debt of the funds. Fortunately, these are all rich and, hopefully, sophisticated investors. They can afford the loss.

Bear Sterns (and its stockholders) is also a big loser. In order to salvage its reputation, it has been forced to loan money to these insolvent hedge funds. The likelihood that it will see this money back: very low. Who cares? They are the ones who set up this scheme to begin with. They deserve to lose.

The other wall street banks who loaned to the hedge funds appear to have come out OK; they will get their money back.

The sub-prime borrowers are a mixed bag. Some are very lucky. They received loans on much better terms than have been available at any other time in our history to such poor credit risks. Many now own houses and have equity. Others are not so lucky because they can't pay their mortgages. (of course, these people often put no money down, so they are essentially right back where they started).

So why do you think this "bail out" was so horrible and unfair? Please explain.

Hmmm , here's a better question: why would I be interested in responding to some ass who can't even respect my fake name?

My point, fagaloon, was not that this bailout was unfair vis a vis other bailouts. My point is that the general distribution of profits is unfairly tilted toward all shareholders when, in fact, they do not bear particularly high risks.

SF (I can only guess what that means): You probably had it right the way you said it. I am curious as to this remark:

"much better terms"

Define what you mean by that remark.

I also have atough time understanding the terminology of "Many" is that like the "experts say?

You are a big one for generalities and tend to stay away from detail. Vice President maybe?