Read the article. Understand that 46 other states and thousands of communities and counties are having the same problem. Then think about what happens when they all see price levels tripped and they all attempt to hit the "sell" button a the same time.

Instead of just leaving you hanging.so what does this really mean?

Let's play a not so far fetched game of "what if"..

What if the Obama supporters and power brokers understand that their is not one single thing they can do to hold on to their majority in the House and possibly the Senate..

and

What if this pension crisis is the key they need to finish the goal of total control of the financial system within a centralized group of regulators under the Executive Branch in cooperation with the Federal Reserve..

and

What if they just stopped all market intervention from now until after the elections. The market corrects and despite reflex rallies is proceeds to a 40-50% correction after the Republican victory and the media plus administration convince enough idiots that the Republican victory is to blame.

and

What if they assembled a new law in the Lame Duck session which created a specific GSE which insured and backstopped all retirement plans, pensions (public or private), 401K's, IRA's, etc. and promised to reset the values of all of them to July 1, 2010 levels.

and

What if they took all of that money and invested it only the Primary Dealers of the Federal Reserve and into U.S. Treasury issues.

Sound far fetched? Think about who is in charge, read the various legislative acts that have been passed into law thus far, and consider that these people are playing for keeps. The winners? Bondholders of U.S. Treasury issues able to sell out at a profit, the Federal Reserve who can deleverage their balance sheet at taxpayer expense, and the Congress who will get credit for "reducing" the dependency on foreign purchasers of our crappy bonds and bills.

God help us, this is too logical and too obvious, thus I think it is a legitimate concern. Dow 4217 anyone?  John Galt

(Crain's) — Illinois Teachers' Retirement System, Springfield, plans to sell $3 billion in investments, or about 10% of its $33.1 billion in assets, in the current fiscal year to pay pension benefits, according to Dave Urbanek, public information officer.

The system is the fifth Illinois statewide defined benefit plan to sell off investments this fiscal year to pay benefits.

Illinois State Universities Retirement System, Champaign, expects to sell $1.2 billion in investments from its $12.2 billion defined benefit fund this fiscal year to raise liquidity to pay benefits to participants.

The Illinois State Board of Investment, Chicago, could sell $840 million investments from its $9.9 billion fund to pay benefits of the Illinois State Employees' Retirement System, Illinois Judges' Retirement System and Illinois General Assembly Retirement System. ISBI oversees the investments of the three systems.

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