We are in need of swift and far-reaching actions

Sir Lawrence Summers in "Wake up to the dangers of a deepening crisis" November 25 mentions that there needs to be a comprehensive approach taken to maintaining demand in the housing market to the maximum extent possible…[and] to assure that there is a continuing flow of reasonably priced loans to credit worthy home purchasers." This sounds right though let us hope that with it he does not refer to a need for maintaining the prices of the houses. The more intense the market is allowed to work the shorter the adjustment period and that should really be the primary goal. This subprime bad tooth needs to be pulled out very fast if we are to avoid much worse complications.

The other thing we need to do fast is to start to comprehend the real significance of systemic errors in a globalized environment. What brought us here and what could have happened if this subprime mess had had two more years of build-up before exploiting? Let us shiver at the idea and start doing something about it. Please reign in our bank regulators and their commissars the credit rating agencies. Without them, this would not have occurred.