As the kids were gearing up for Halloween just a few weeks ago, everything seemed right in the financial world -- or at least, back on the right track.
Europe had hammered out an against-the-odds agreement to save Greece and bolster its bailout fund. The U.S. economy was revving up again with a solid third-quarter report on the gross domestic product. And central banks around the world were opening the floodgates, washing the financial markets in more cheap cash.
Then it all went wrong. It went wrong because of politicians. It went wrong because of democracy. And it's about to go wrong again if the bipartisan "supercommittee" in Congress fails to agree on at least $1.2 trillion in budget savings over the next 10 years through tax hikes and cuts to popular programs like Medicare and defense spending.
Read Full Article »