Media Tenor reports on the basis of extensive monitoring of US newscasts that the economic crisis is finally getting TV attention and that the result is sweeping pessimism in the US and abroad.

Here’s a graphic illustrating what’s happening.

DEATH WATCH ON BANKS

Mike Whitny: The FDIC has begun the “death watch” on the many banks which are currently drowning in their own red ink.

ANALYST: DOZENS OF U.S. BANKS WILL FAIL BY 2010

THE RISE OF THE PAWN SHOP ECONOMY

A Credit Card You Want to Toss - Yahoo! News

HOUSING PRICES COULD DROP YET ANOTHER 25%

FORECLOSURES CONTINUE TO RISE: HOME FORECLOSURES hit record levels in 2007–and there’s a lot worse to come.

That’s the view of both homeowners’ advocates and Wall Street companies, based on the upward spike in foreclosures last year and falling home prices that will leave some homeowners paying mortgages that cost far more than their houses are worth.

According to the company RealtyTrac, an online marketer of foreclosure properties, 2.2 million foreclosure filings were reported in 2007, a 75 percent increase over 2006. The trend, moreover, is for the worse, with foreclosures in December 2007 nearly doubling over the number in December 2006.

Many of these foreclosures were those with sub-prime loans–mortgages with high interest rates to begin with, or adjustable rates that ballooned beyond the buyers’ ability to pay.

But, says economist Dean Baker, “We are just seeing the beginning of the crisis.”

What else to read

For more background on the worsening state of the economy, see Joel Geier’s “The coming economic meltdown” in the new issue of the International Socialist Review.

For a closer look at the mortgage and housing crisis, see Petrino DiLeo’s “Housing bubble deflates,” published in the ISR last year. New York Times columnist Paul Krugman’s article “Don’t Cry for Me, America” underlines the scale of the crisis.

“There are a lot of people with little or no equity in their homes, who owe more on their mortgage than what the house is worth–for example, people who paid $300,000 on a house that’s now worth $250,000,” said Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research.

Baker pointed to a report by the National Association of Realtors showing that in 2006, more than 40 percent of homebuyers financed the entire purchase of their homes–that is, paid no down-payment.

Now, of course, house prices are falling–a drop of 8.4 percent in November over the same period a year ago, according to the S&P Case/Schiller housing price index. In some localities, the drop is much more severe. As Baker pointed out in a recent article, home prices in San Diego are dropping at a 27 percent annual rate. In Los Angeles, the rate of decline is 24.7 percent, and in San Francisco, 22.2 percent.

INVESTMENT NEWS: LATEST FINANCE SCHEME BUSTED

Two directors of a Detroit area accounting firm – along with their wives – were instrumental in perpetuating a $250 million Ponzi scheme that collapsed last summer, according to a lawsuit filed Tuesday in Oakland County, Mich., circuit court.

The suit alleges that Doeren Mayhew & Co. PC and two directors, Todd Fox and James O’Rilley, along with their spouses, were a “de facto part of the management of the Ponzi scheme enterprise” that turned out to be a fraud.

The suit represents about 100 individuals and companies that invested in the Ponzi and seeks $20 million in damages as well as restitution of money lost in the investments.

Socializing was key in maintaining the investment scheme, according to the suit.

“Doeren Mayhew, through Messrs. Fox and O’Rilley, orchestrated and participated ‘dog-and-pony’ or ‘road’ shows targeting investors perceived to be the most vulnerable to the lure of ‘guaranteed high-return’ investments being offered,” according to the suit.