Dr. Bernanke keeps trying, but---

It reminds me of a typical "House" segment. The patient has a mysterious illness, and nobody can figure out why or what's causing that blood to spurt out of the patient's eyeballs. The team of young doctors comes in, tests for perceived diseases. Meanwhile, House is home taking his meds for chronic pain and drowning in his chronic misery.

A member of House's surrounding team of young doctors comes up with a theory and attempts a treatment. Still, the blood spurts.

By the end of the program, House, like the white irascible knight he is, comes up with the diagnosis, and most of the time the patient miraculously survives the once-mysterious malady, often because of a simple fix. House's life continues to move on badly, and we wait another week for the next medical anomaly for the brilliant physician to unravel.

The economic mess in which we're mired reminds me of one of those patients on the popular Fox TV series, and I'm viewing Ben Bernanke and his team of economic geniuses as our real version of "House." At this point, nobody's really quite sure what the disease happens to be or exactly how to cure it.

Bernanke and the team are trying their best to look at the symptoms, study the precedents and figure out a cure. This morning we saw another interest rate cut added to the mix. That comes after several other band aides and bandages have been applied to the American patient and, in recent days, to several others the world around.

Seems like we've got a financial pandemic on our hands, and the docs don't know quite what to do about it. After all this time of the health experts preparing for us for potential bird flus and swine flus, we shoulda been getting ready for money failure.

It's downright scary to think about the magnitude of this mess. And, when Dr. Bernanke gets on the TV like he did yesterday and paints such a picture of doom and gloom for the next couple of years, it's hard for everyday ordinary folks like us to fathom how much this disease is gonna hurt and for how long.

Until we regain some confidence in the fact that the smart docs are figuring out the answers and taking care of our financial well-being even to one-tenth of the degree we've seen in the past, I guess we're going to have to resort to self-treatment.

And, maybe that's been the key all along. We have to live well but prepare for the worst. I've said several times this year, upon hearing more and more bleak financial news, that I just go plant more potatoes. I did plant several batches of them over the summer and my supply exceeds that of past years, but I could have done better.

We still have wise elderly people in our midst who have lived through times much worse than this. Maybe now is the time to spend some time talking with them and learning what they and their families did to survive the Great Depression.

Maybe now is the time for parents of young children to include a segment in their child rearing which emphasizes self reliance, responsible handling of money, appreciation and care for material belongings as opposed to a "throw away" mentality, conservation of water, electricity, etc., and sensible planning for future crises rather than simply living in the moment.

Maybe now is also the time to demand a emphasis in our education system to focus on practical mathematical skills dealing with personal finance, the importance of being well read on a variety of social issues, and an keen appreciation for historical precedents of similar situations that can instruct us on the here and now.

I think, for the most part, the patient has been living in a vacuum, oblivious of outside forces which can invade when least expected. An injection of vigilance, healthy skepticism, the old Boy Scout motto of being prepared, diversified investing of individual resources, and flexibility would go far to improve the long-term prognosis of this patient with the mysterious, mind-boggling disease----maybe even a lot further than the band aides we've employed up to this point.

We could very well be on the brink of a colossal shift in life as we have known it. If that be true, we need to employ whatever self treatment we can muster and take some personal responsibility to ease the pain and suffering that may lie ahead.

Unlike Dr. House, I don't think Dr. Bernanke, with all his band-aides, will swoop in with a magical cure for what ails us all.