Money making the world go roundly pear shaped

We appear to be being held to ransom by the bankers. In the US the Government is spending amounts of money we can't even imagine to bail out their two largest mortgage firms, Freddie Mac and Fanny Mae - firms which were set up originally by Government to provide cheap homes to buy or let for the less wealthy end of the American dream

Like everything where money, and bonuses for the executives, was involved greed took over and away they went building their house of cards and coining in the cash. When the crash came the whole financial system was under threat and the Government had little choice but to step in.

British banks, not slow to get their snouts into any trough, no matter how murky the fare on offer, bought huge bundles of dodgy mortgages on the promise of untold wealth from the modern day snake oil salesman in the US.

With financial Armageddon nigh the Government is considering bailing the banks out by the simple process of we, the taxpayer, basically taking over their burst bubble job lots so that they can get back to making their comfy profits and paying their equally comfy bonuses.

We take all the risk and they take the profits. Leading the review for the Government and working out the best course of action is City banker Sir James Crosby so no prizes there for guessing which way he will be leaning.

Probably there is little else the Government can do but if we are going to pay the piper then it should be our tune and we could start by getting rid of the old pals act, soft touch control of the financial sector which allowed the banks to get us all into this mess in the first place - even if it does mean a few politicians will miss out on cushy jobs on bank boards when they finally leave us in peace.