This could be the big one, Elizabeth

Nouriel Roubini says we're screwed.  Well, he said it yesterday, but it's probably still true.

It is now clear that the US financial system - and now even the system of financing of the corporate sector - is now in cardiac arrest and at a risk of a systemic financial meltdown.

Wait – it gets better:

Yesterday, Thursday, a senior market practitioner in a major financial institution wrote to me the following:

Situation Report: So far as I can tell by working the telephones this morning:

• LIBOR bid only, no offer. 
  
• Commercial paper market shut down, little trading and no issuance. 
  
• Corporations have no access to long or short term credit markets -- hence they face massive rollover problems. 
  
• Brokers are increasingly not dealing with each other. 
  
• Even the inter-bank market is ceasing [seizing] up.

This cannot continue for more than a few days. This is the economic equivalent to cardiac arrest. Then we debated what is necessary to restart the system.

I believe that the government will do another Hail Mary pass, with massive guarantees to the short-term commercial credit system and wide open short-term lending by the Fed (2 or 3 times expansion of the Fed balance sheet). If done on a sufficient scale this action will probably work for a while. But none of these financial measures affects the accelerating recession -- which will in turn place more pressure on the financial sector.

It's all Greek to me, but reading through to the end of his post will not assure a peaceful weekend for anyone.

Via Hilzoy.