The Economy Makes Me Stupid

I am attempting to write a 10 page paper about the economy...how we ended up in this recession or depression or whatever it is (who or what is to blame) from an ethical standpoint, what is being done to fix it, why those attempts are not working, and what I think needs to be done. LOL! Economics was my least favorite class in school. In fact, it was one of the two q-drops I used at A&M. I had to drop because I was failing and take it again. Which I did and, thankfully, with the help of an awesome study partner I passed with a B, but it cost me my $1,000 rebate for graduating in four years. That is beside the point, of course. I took that class at least five years ago. How can I explain how confusing this is to me now? I feel like I understand bits and pieces and sometimes I feel as though I grasp enough to actually join those bits and pieces together and put pen to paper...then I sit with the pen poised...or in this case with my fingers poised over my computer's keyboard...and BAM! I hit the mother of all brick walls! Soon after that I very nearly experience an epic-sized panic attack. I say near because to this point I have not yet succumbed to it...completely. Just border-line. That is as close as I want to get, but if this drags out any longer I cannot say what will happen. So, in the midst of my journey through articles about mortgage companies and subprime lending, Keynesian economics, and panic-stricken Americans my brain sputters and dies. I come to this point of self-preservation where I decide that if I try much harder to make sense of this jumbled mess I am going to finally reach the point of a major mental breakdown, that epic-sized panic attack I mentioned above. I end up fighting the urge to work on my book or I go to bed or, in this case, I write a blog post. That is productive. Not quite the productivity I am looking for, but productive all the same.

I must hire an economist. How much do those go for these days?