These are some ideas, some stolen from others, or old textbooks.

Stop socializing losses, and privatizing gains.

Companies that are too big to fail, are too big to exist.

The people who drove us into the ditch should be the ones to pay for the tow truck to pull us out.

For big banks / insurers that want to give bonuses for risky behavior, those bonuses should be tied to long term efforts. And they shouldn't be paid out until those risky ventures are completed, and paid back.

Regulate away "complex" financial products. CDO's and other innovative debt instruments that take junk rated bonds and magically create AAA rated investments only existed because of a lack of regulation that allowed financial wizards to work magic.

Get govt out of the confidence business; don't let banks and insurers do innovative things, and don't let the govt give the OK / approval of them. When people run honest businesses, they don't need to generate confidence. Ponzi schemes need confidence.

This disaster is a chance to dramatically change the system. Moving away from keeping the status quo, and to a more equitable society with universal healthcare and stronger unions will make life for 75% of America much more stable and calm. Good marriages are boring, and calm. Exciting marriages show up on Cops and Jerry Springer.

Main street life needs to get decoupled from Wall Street gyrations. Americans' retirement, healthcare, and job security shouldn't get decided by corporate Overlords in NYC, London, Dubai or Hong Kong. People should have anxiety about their business, not the financial wizards who get booked on CNBC and Faux Business News.

All these ideas need to get out, and let the Wizards and Wall Street whizzes need to have their say, but then it needs to be followed by someone pointing out the fact that these are the same idiots that drove Lehman Bros, AIG, Morgan Stanley, etc into the ditch.

Unions need more power. More people with more power over their own lives is good for America. We've followed the idea for 35 years that America needs to kill off unions, and give more power to Corporate Overlords. That is one of the reasons we're in the ditch today. Unions are a check on the power of corporations.