The hosts of NPR's "Planet Money" recently interviewed Paul Krugman. They mentioned to the starconomist that he sounded much nicer than in his columns. To that he replied, "Oh, in person I'm just a pussycat."

You wouldn't imagine so reading Krugman. Since the start of the economic crisis, his columns have been doomsday polemics. Today's column Stop The Pain, while a bit more hopeful ("supply of houses is lagging behind population growth, which will eventually prompt a housing revival"), continues Krugman's prognostications of further economic turmoil.

At the end of today's column, Krugman offered President Obama a piece of advice: bite the bullet and take over the weak banks. That's not happening. And what shareholders, taxpayers and consumers have to gain from the banks like BOA and Citigroup remaining quasi-privately held is anyone's guess. If you want to free up credit for America citizens clearly Vikram Pandit isn't the guy to do it -- I don't care if he makes a dollar a year.

We can't just let CitiBank fail. Though if it did, could I get out of paying off my student loan? -SB