Bringing Down Bear Stearns is an essay that claims to tell the story of Bear Stearns last days. Some parts of it are a little dubious, like the repeated hints that Bear Stearns demise was all due to the work of some evil short sellers. Once you read the article all the way through, you get a sense of a how fragile Bear Stearn’s position was and it makes you doubt that anyone would have had to deliberately do it in.

Nonetheless, the article makes for a great read once you get past the rather slow beginning. Some of the anecdotes in the article will fill you will unholy glee such as when you read about the Bear Stearns traders grousing about the risk adverse nature of Warren Buffett. Other anecdotes will make you wonder how independent the Federal Reserve really is. One gets the impression that Paulson was calling a lot of the shots for the Fed.