While all of us have been concerned about the amount of money being spent by the U.S. Treasury as it implements the bailout (in the neighborhood of $700 billion), the real amount committed so far is actually north of $7 trillion. While we've been focusing on the U.S. Treasury that's been spending billions, we haven't been paying attention to the Federal Reserve and FDIC that are committing trillions. And they don't even want to tell the public what that money is being committed to and what collateral has been provided.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=an3k2rZMNgDw

The U.S. government is prepared to provide more than $7.76 trillion on behalf of American taxpayers after guaranteeing $306 billion of Citigroup Inc. debt yesterday. The pledges, amounting to half the value of everything produced in the nation last year, are intended to rescue the financial system after the credit markets seized up 15 months ago...

The money that's been pledged is equivalent to $24,000 for every man, woman and child in the country. It's nine times what the U.S. has spent so far on wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to Congressional Budget Office figures. It could pay off more than half the country's mortgages.

Absolutely amazing. Most Americans knew the bailout was a bad idea. Now we are seeing just how bad.

Given the trillions of dollars being committed by the Fed and FDIC, it really highlights the absurdity of the hearings on the auto industry in order for the Big Three to secure $25 billion. Either our elected officials don't know what's going on and don't realize how silly they look bickering over $25 billion or they do know what's going on and the auto industry hearings are an intentional distraction to keep us from paying attention to the real big money being spent and committed.

That's bad news either way.

This economic situation could be a lot worse than even the "very bad" situation everyone's been talking about. We're dealing with either ignorance or intentional deceit by people in power... and the amounts of money are astronomical.

$7.76 trillion is about equal to a one dollar bill being placed at every inch between here and the sun.