reality-based educator

The top financial story at The Street:

Stocks Back on Easy Street

The top financial story at Reuters:

U.S. stocks rose on Wednesday as takeover activity resurfaced and credit markets stabilized, luring investors back into riskier assets such as equities.

The top financial story at Marketwatch:

U.S. tide expected to lift Asia
Stocks expected to open higher on strength of U.S. markets' gains, alleviating fears of subprime meltdown's effect on U.S. economy.

Seems pretty clear to me - the panic is over, confidence is returning, liquidity is fine.

So tell me again, if everything I'm reading at Reuters, The Street, Bloomberg and Marketwatch is true, then why are all the free-market conservatives who usually hate government intervention/bailouts demanding at least one rate cut from the Federal Reserve in the next month and more cuts before the end of the year?

I mean, if everything's swell in the equity and credit markets and M&A season is all set to go after Labor Day, why does Helicopter Ben have to shower the market (and the economy) with cheap money?

Unless of course things aren't really that good...

...or are REALLY, REALLY scary just below the surface and when everything breaks, oh, boy look out below...

POSTSCRIPT: Barry at Big Picture calls the people demanding rate cuts whining and pleading and crying and begging and beseeching and howling and weeping anti-free market self-cry babies.

That gets it pretty well.

UPDATE: The ECB still plans to raise interest rates in September:

FRANKFURT -- The European Central Bank signaled that it is still inclined to raise interest rates by a quarter of a percentage point on Sept. 6 to 4.25%, provided market turmoil doesn't deepen.

...

In a statement, the central bank said "the position of the Governing Council of the ECB on its monetary policy stance was expressed by its President on 2 August 2007." At that time, ECB President Jean-Claude Trichet said the bank would exercise "strong vigilance" against inflation risks. The phrase is the bank's standard expression to indicate a rate rise in a month.

As the ECB and other central banks have pumped billions into markets over the past weeks in order to quell a global credit crunch, analysts and investors have scaled back expectations of a quarter-point interest-rate rise next month by the ECB.

The statement "means that the events so far have not yet brought the ECB to the point of taking back the pre-announced Sept. 6 rate hike," says Holger Schmieding, senior European economist with Bank of America in London.

Also, Asian stocks are gaining for the fourth consecutive day:

Aug. 23 -- Asian stocks gained for a fourth day, the longest winning streak in seven weeks, after a capital injection into the biggest U.S. mortgage lender reduced concern a credit-market tightening will derail economic growth.

With markets soaring all over the world this week and the credit market stabilized for now, can all the whiny ass anti-free market titty babies shut the fuck up about Economic Armageddon and the need for a rate cut for a few days until we actually get some signs that Economic Armageddon is actually here?