More Random Reading

• Warren Buffett at the NYT, discussing our rapidly-increasing national debt.
• A reminder that we still may need more bank regulation. Remember how in the immediate aftermath of Lehman/Bears, everyone was crying out for more regulation? Now some are claiming that the government simply dropped the ball, and that sufficient regulation already existed. I've linked to an article of that opinion before in this post.
• Perhaps free-market health care is the answer (in two parts: part 1, part 2). Part 2 is the more interesting segment. I think the author is not adequately dealing with underprivileged kids and the elderly; otherwise, he makes a pretty good case that a free-market system may be best assuming we as a society take care of 'pre-existing conditions'. Also, as pointed out by a reader with whom I discussed this article earlier, he does not deal with tort reform.
• More on healthcare: an article that talks about why Obama is struggling to convince people to work with him on reform. Note that the article is focused on why he's struggling; there does not seem to be much of an opinion either way on free-market vs universal care. More importantly, it contains 20 links (count it, 20!!) to different articles, ranging from conservative to liberal. I still haven't read through all 20, but it seems like a nice resource. *UPDATE* I was wrong, he does lean to universal care. I missed that in my first read-through.
  
• A representative saying Social Security could default within two years!
• PIMCO on the dollar, both valuation and as global reserve currency. Plenty of re-hash of popular, recent economic commentary, but a nice summary nevertheless.