The revelation of the week in the mainstream press was the 11 people who got million dollar retention bonuses from AIG and no longer work for the company.

How many times have you heard, “the economy won’t turn around until banks start lending?” It’s so damn obvious…

The big comeback should already be here, according to Wall Street pundits. It was due to arrive in the fourth quarter… a 50 percent increase in earnings led by – of all sectors – banks.

Back in 1999, I traveled to Moscow with a group of powerful business people and government officials. The most powerful of them all was Sandy Weill, CEO of Citi at the time.

Vulnerable companies in the utility sector are certainly showing shorting opportunities. Andrew Gordon of Investor’s Daily Edge suggests that although the “recession has finally caught up to the utilities,” there is opportunity for triple digits gains.

Demand is way down for iron ore and the negotiated price between China and its major suppliers is due for a big hit. Last year the price almost doubled. This year could see prices almost cut in half.

How bad is it going to get? Our reference point is the 1930’s and the Great Depression. But people in Russia and Asia only have to recall events of a little more than a decade ago. The “Asian Contagion” actually began in Russia in 1998 when the country defaulted on its national debt. The crisis then hit Thailand and within a year had spread to all of Asia with a few exceptions (Malaysia and China being the main ones).

The economy is now staring eyeball-to-eyeball with an activist U.S. government. It will legislate, reform, supervise, bully, give out money like cotton candy and get concessions in return.

Two years ago, I talked to a Canadian bank and they swore to me that the subprime crisis which was surfacing in the U.S. at the time wouldn’t touch them. The bank’s shares have since fallen 40 percent. You can run but you can’t hide.