Crisis?

From Yahoo's Market Overview (changing link):

2:00 pm : The stock market extends its gains and then holds near session highs.  All ten sectors are posting a gain.  The worst performing sector, utilities, is up 0.9%,  The best performing sector, financials, is up 10.7% (emphasis mine - Chris).

At the time of this posting the Dow is up 371.

Oh, and Congress has gone on a two day break. Wonder if that might be helping?

On a more serious note... Yes, I know this is probably a combination of dead-cat bounce and latent hopes that the Paulsen plan might be revived. The true impact of a complete failure to pass any bailout will take weeks to be felt.

But I think there is an important message here. Those who are arguing that we are in a crisis are doing a terrible job of conveying to the American people the true nature of the crisis. Most of the messages coming from the pundits, politicians and business press are akin to, "Things are bad, but it's to complicated to explain, so just trust us that things are bad and give us a ton of your money."

That is not exactly a message that will win The People over. But then the political/business/media class in this country long ago lost the ability to even care what the The People think.