He spoke for nearly an hour with no notes, no distracting power point, and no handouts. He did not push his new book. He did not pander or proselytize. In fact, as everyone who talks about the crisis is starting to sound the same, Curnutte sounded refreshingly original. Maybe it is because, as he admitted to this writer on a phone interview later, he does not have cable television. Strange as it may sound for an expert who appears at least every other week on a national news shows ranging from Fox News to CNBC, Curnutte derives nearly all of this information the old fashion way. He reads it.

Even more unique, in our interview Curnutte cited materials ranging as far afield as an esoteric book about The Great Depression to a Mark Twain short story to a economic paper by famed economist Arthur Laffer. Never far from his citations, almost to a dizzying degree, is the Wall Street Journal. Leaving several of the attendees to wonder after the lecture ‘how he keeps the journal dry when he showers’.

The core of Curnutte’s message to Tulane professors and MBA students was twofold. First, significant opportunities present themselves during periods of extreme market movements in either direction and ‘public interventions of late can not be effective without significant cooperation from the private sector’. Secondly, the current economic crisis has more to do with government failures over the last 20 years than with any other single reason.

He pulled no punches when describing policy makers. At times calling them ‘vapid and dull’ and at other times calling them ‘impotent and criminally incompetent.’ But the most striking of his comments came as he described the crisis, made predictions about the future, and offered solutions. The tendency for most experts is to devolve into jargon, but Curnutte spoke in plain terms. At times, he even bordered on a folksy, conversational tone. When asked by a student to speculate on what might be next, he unhesitatingly offered his prediction of the stock market, the bond market, and the timing of a housing recovery and even described in detail what path the government bailout should take and how best to implement it. Readers will note that Curnutte found first fame last summer when he predicted the timing and size of liquidity injections by the Federal Reserve as well as the failure of Washington Mutual and Indy Mac nearly a year before the events.

I have reviewed dozens of speakers over the last few years. Some were surprisingly inspiring or surprisingly insightful. Most were disappointing. But Curnutte evoked the most significant reactions of any speaker I have heard. He was very clearly in charge of his subject – leaving the audience with the feeling that if we all had more time, there was a great deal more we could learn. He was energetic to the degree that he may have intimidated the more sedate in the lecture hall. His general demeanor was that of a man who has a hard time walking from place to place and instead breaks into a run for no apparent reason. His style of communicating was entirely original and he had the uncanny ability to reduce complexities to simple stories.

Kudos to our speaker series for landing Steve Curnutte. He was by far and away the best to date. In fact, it would not surprise this writer to see a voice that clear, and a message that strong, elevated to a national stage in short order.

I am not one for overstatement so when I see an overstatement it tends to get a response. My initial reaction was that your statement was all over the board pulling in the worst of oversight, the government and the best of the American people, their morale soul. This did not make sense to me, making it hard to respond. But I think I got after a few moments of thought.

Regulation is to help in not letting this happen again but since the S & L scandals of the 80′s, Enron, Arthur Andersen, the dot.com ‘no income statement is ok’ bubble and now this in housing industry — all we can do is help curb the abuse so not to get to a crisis. The Wall Street snakes parlay the rules & twist them to tremendous personal gain by using the system — so regulation whether punitive or not will not stop the snakes that prey upon their countrymen. I know, many of my Wharton School classmates participate.

Federal control, heck that is old time politics. It spurs emotion, the emotion of an evil entity(but you knew that). In reality there is no federal control as all the representatives are ‘installed’ by those with influence and cash. These industry representatives in the House and Senate create the environment that continues to afford those with influence and cash to prosper (ok, throw in a few Horatio Alger stories to counter the $ 100 million dollar CEO). You understand why something is too big to fail, right? That is the environment that appears to work best, best to manipulate the gains. Again, their is no federal control, that was the 1930′s.

Lastly, you speak of the American soul. A better, more transparent object to strike the blow against should have been our standard of living. Regulations or not our American standard of living is retreating everywhere you look. Our morale soul is not part of our economy or capitalism. We are told that continually by those opposed to regulation. Trust them, self-regulate, deliver no burden as it will crush the economy — and there is no genuflection when this is being said. Maybe if someone had a morale soul to hold the line on immoral behavior we’d not be in this crisis. Not this time, not ever I suspect. It requires a conscience, a morale soul and an open mind. The initial interview usually weeds those folks out of banking.

Sil Tuppins

The wheels of the global slow down are about to screech. The sound will be painful and surprising to Americans. But demand will do more than slow, it will vanish. If inflation pressures hit us in the US, it will not be because of global demand, it will be because our dollar has crumbled under the weight of overwhelming debt.

Tough times are ahead. Shore up all cash positions in CDRS accounts with FDIC insurance. Ladder your investments to maintatin liquidity, earn your 3 or 4 percent and stay home for the next 3 years. Anyone who tells youe differently is earning a commission, or they went to the University of Phoenix.