On Sun, 07 Dec 2008 11:21:27 -0500, Joseph Gwinn
wrote:

As for the rating agencies, there is a very interesting article on the
front page of todays (lead article, 7 Dec 08) New York Times: "Debt
Watchdogs: Tamed or Caught Napping?".

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/07/business/07rating.html?partner=rss&emc=rss
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Thanks for another good article.

best line was
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snip
When Moody’s began lowering the ratings of a wave of debt in July
2007, many investors were incredulous.

==“If you can’t figure out the loss ahead of the fact, what’s
the use of using your ratings?”== asked an executive with Fortis
Investments, a money management firm, in a July 2007 e-mail
message to Moody’s. “You have legitimized these things, leading
people into dangerous risk.”
snip
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Unka' George [George McDuffee]
-------------------------------------------
He that will not apply new remedies,
must expect new evils:
for Time is the greatest innovator: and
if Time, of course, alter things to the worse,
and wisdom and counsel shall not alter them to the better,
what shall be the end?

Francis Bacon (1561-1626), English philosopher, essayist, statesman.
Essays, "Of Innovations" (1597-1625).