The screen of the spectacle of the meltdown of financial capitalism dazzles us and makes us feel numb with fear. We struggle to find the words to express our feelings and thoughts. We cannot comprehend the numbers of the bailout, the swiftness of the destructive flows and the astronomical quantities of value disappearing into a black hole.

Prior to the meltdown we lived the financial phantasmagoria of a credit bubble that seduced us into buying big houses, new cars, maxing the credit card, borrowing on the equity in the house to buy shares in the mining companies in a world marked by the end of ideology. We are winners. Greed is a wonderful passion.

We watch the massive destructive flows on the stockmarket in fascination and sense that its just not virtual numbers--- everything is going wrong, yet again, just like it did in the 1930s. The 'financial' crisis has spilt over into the real economy our political leaders say to show they are "ahead of the curve". Hang a mo---does that mean financial capitalism is unreal? How can it be unreal?

We realize that the last six months we had lived the fiction that the credit crunch was containable. That has been dispelled. Recession looms. Oh no. Not again. That means even more reduction is household wealth, as if the stockmarket collapse wasn't enough. Our life is going to even more damaged than it was before.