Institutional Risk Analytics:

Indeed, yesterday we were slumming at the Four Seasons in New York. Among the dinosaurs we observed grazing in the tall grass of this Midtown Manhattan refuge for the transactional class was former C director Robert Rubin, former New York Fed Chairman Pete Peterson* and Treasury Secretary Geithner, who apparently was there to get new instructions from his sponsors.

Before Geithner arrived for lunch, Peterson reportedly asked one NY real estate mogul: "How much of that toxic paper is there?" Now we may know where Geithner gathers his market intelligence -- over a luncheon table in New York with his owners. Next time we are going to bring the flip-cam.

So, why'd he ask?

I mean, shouldn't he know, if anyone does?

Or was he going to ask Geithner too, and wanted to check Tiimmy's answer?

Or could it be that two years into the Big Shitstorm, we still don't know how big the Big Shitpile is? If so, well done, rulerz! I knew we paid you the big bucks for something!

NOTE Not the same as Pete Peterse, cat-food-for-the-elderly advocate and billionaire.