A bit of an understatement on the day that the Dow dropped another 733 points, eh?

Peter Goodman at The Times noted Mr. Bernanke also made this curious observation at his Economic Club of NY appearance:

The real concern that we have is that we have got and developed, in this country, a very serious ‘too big to fail’ problem. And that problem, we’ve just recognized now in the current situation, how severe it is.

Just recognized? That’s right. I forgot the banks just kinda merged themselves.

Or has this all just been a red scare?

These cartoons of Comrades Paulson and Bernanke come courtesy of Bill Perkins, 39, a Houston-based venture capitalist at Small Ventures USA who has run all three as full page ads in the New York Times and other media recently.

Sez Stephen Colbert: “Garfield, the bar has been raised.”

The story goes that Perkins had made $1.25 million betting that Goldman Sachs had better fundamentals than its peers. He cashed out after Paulson announced the bailout plan and pledged to use his gain to campaign against the bailout.

“The stock did OK because the government came in and said, ‘No one can fail,’” he told the Journal. “It’s capitalism on the way up and communism on the way down.”

He commissioned an art collective called Otabenga Jones & Associates to draw cartoons for the campaign.

Why cartoons?

“I felt like a bunch of words on a piece of paper – people wouldn’t read, but with a picture, people get it right away,” he said.

Of course, the bailout passed anyway. And the government could yet commit hundreds of billions more to banks.

In an email, Perkin’s assistant said that they are considering the possibility of running more ads, but haven’t finalized anything at this time.

I hope they do. I’m fed up with the NY Times not having a comics page.