I would like to see the Federal Government help the airlines. I have flown extensively in the United States and around the world. Also, I have flown the airlines in many countries. The best airline system I have seen is in China. Nice planes, fair price, good service and very timely. Thailand is better intracountry also. Turkish Airlines are par or better with the US. Our airlines need help. These other countries give the airlines support. We need to do the same.

The Uzbek could use an infusion of captital in thier intracountry airlines.

...where does the money to do this come from?

We are beyond broke. The federal government is doing its level best to hide that fact from the public to prevent widespread panic.

I did inhale.

I'm reminded of the old joke from the '70's; Brezhnev is showing his mother around his new house. It's huge, with everything imaginable and she asks, "But Leonid, aren't you afraid the communists might come back?"

Capitalism outlived communism, but it's not immortal. In order to create and store capital, it must be invested. Since everyone wants as much as possible, ever more imaginative ways must be found to invest it. The real estate market is the high powered explosive wrapped around the nuclear core of derivatives. That happened to Fannie and Freddie was the countdown reaching zero and the ignition sequence starting.

99 shoes to drop, 99 shoes on the floor
98 shoes to drop, 98 shoes on the floor
97 shoes to drop, 97 shoes on the floor
and so on...

When I was 24-26 years old and pissed off at Nixon-Agnew and conventional institutions, I could care less about the Oil Embargo, the severe Bear market of 1973-on, and went about building "alternative" organizations. By 1982, I began buying shares or fractional shares using DRIPs (dividend reinvestment programs run by individual companies like MMM, IBM, many utilities, et.al.). Two-plus decades later, I have many dozens of quality companies and some clunkers, including some banks. Every time I had a hundred bucks I could spare--or more, or as little as $50, I put it into a DRIP stock.
As a student of History, I have read widely on finance, especially the past 175 years of Industrial development. I have read of panics and manias and periods of low volatility. The U.S. and global financial markets are, in my humble opinion, on a ledge overlooking a vast canyon below. No, they are already resting uneasily on a lower ledge, having already teetered and fallen off the higher precipice. I cannot believe the "me" of the 1970's would applaud any bailout of fat cats of many stripes simply because financial failures caused by their own imprudence might spread around the planet. The principled "me" of the 2000's is screaming (to my two U.S. Senators and House Representative by e-mail, futile that such may be) that the progenitors of this severe crisis must be held accountable. Good luck, pal sez I to "me". No way will any D.C. Hearings do anything much, even if this debacle turns into Great Depression II. The fingers are everywhere on this crime scene. That is piteous...and it may prove calamitous, but the society is much different than that of the 1930s. We paeons just have to get real: we ARE all in this mess together and if the dominoes keep falling, and we slip off the ledge, the implications on a sphere with over 6 1/2 billion humans will be near-universal. I despise the bastards, each of them, and the CEO pay scales 400+ times the average worker, but a world-wide financial catastrophe is the same as shooting ourselves--we AGONISTA smarty-pants--right through both feet. Then we won't even be able to walk to the Food Bank for our weekly starch-filled hand-outs. I see the situation as a no-win for all but the centi-millionaires (and above). So if the U.S. wants to try to staunch the bloodflow, I actually wish it/them well. Did anyone see the video footage of the lines outside some branches of IndyMac Banks showing depositors attempting withdrawals? Does Sean-Paul really think the Feds should do nothing? Anyone for gold? Closed today @ over $970/ounce--try buying a roll of toilet paper with a 1 ounce gold coin and take your change in...what, exactly?

on the hemorrhage that occurred with the fracture of International Financing system (with American banks going under and the Mac's being nationalized) until the wound ruptures, then real medicine steps in and 'cure' becomes the sole option left.

I expect the recovery period will be painful and long.