An addendum to something I said to Rick ...

... in our weekend to and fro.  I said:  "[W]e both know that some special interests have the potential to do much greater and longer lasting damage to the common good than other special interests. The masters of the financial system, pursuing their own short-term financial interests, have such potential. I shudder to think about the truly devastating consequences, to the well-being of ordinary families--of mothers, fathers, children--and others, of the kind of massive economic dislocations that the masters of the financial system, left to their own, venal devices, can precipitate."

This morning I read this in a letter by Harvard's Robert Putnam (of "Bowling Alone" fame):  "[T]he adverse impact of economic adversity on the social fabric goes well beyond the lost monetary income and endures much longer than joblessness itself....  [T]he negative effect of joblessness on a worker’s participation in social and community life lasts for decades, even after the worker has found a job again. The damage is particularly great if the joblessness hits earlier in a worker’s career.... [T[]he real costs of the current recession will last long after the G.D.P. resumes growing."