Warning: Your brain is killing America's capitalism
Deadly 800-year-old pandemic keeps repeating: 'This time is different'

By Paul B. Farrell, MarketWatch


ARROYO GRANDE, Calif. (MarketWatch) -- Recovery? New bull market? Yes, yes, get your money out of the mattress, out of CDs and money markets. Buy stocks -- emerging markets. Buy ETF hedge funds. Buy junk bonds, bailed-out banks. Buy. Get back in the market. Buy, buy, buy.

Warning: The investor's brain is infected with a deadly disease. And like P.T. Barnum, Wall Street knows your brain's a sucker just waiting for any excuse to get back to playing their game at their casino by their rules.

Yes, you have a disease. Not swine-flu pandemic, but even more toxic -- to your financial health. Your brain's infected with the 800-year-old "this time is different syndrome." But unlike the swine flu, there's no cure, no shot to protect you from a pandemic. You're exposed.

And yes, Wall Street is taking advantage of you, adding new fees and higher commissions, siphoning off returns. They'll keep it up until the next crash, soon. Then they'll raid the Treasury again -- more bailouts, with your cash. And Congress will give the crooks trillions again, thanks to their lobbyists.

There's no cure. You have it. Congress has it. And with a recovery and a new bull primed to roar, Wall Street's dying to take advantage of your disease.

Want a professional diagnosis? Read "This Time Is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly" by economists Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff. "The best empirical investigation of financial crises ever published," says Harvard's Niall Ferguson, author of "The Ascent of Money." But it's more than just a history of 800 years of never-ending, self-destructive bull/bear, boom/bust cycles. ...............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.marketwatch.com/story/warning-y...