The news is saturated with Hank Paulson’s $700 bailout plan. This is diverting attention away from the increasingly bleak outlook for the wider economy.

Rick Pendergraft says no bailout can immediately solve the problems in the housing market. And all indicators suggest these will run well into 2009 at least.

Rick says your portfolio should be all about playing safe for now. He recommends eight inverse ETF plays to hedge against this downside risk.

This from Investor’s Daily Edge:

I can understand the fixation on the bailout, but other economic reports are getting lost as a result.

Last Thursday was a day that the mass distraction was working to its full capabilities. Investors chose to ignore all economic data in order to focus on the progress of Congress.

In case you missed it, durable goods orders for August were down 4.5 percent from July (I guess the stimulus checks ran out), initial jobless claims jumped to …

Ben Bernanke and Hank Paulson are planning the biggest bailout of financial markets in history. It could cost the taxpayer somewhere in the region of $1 trillion. But the market will triumph over the interventionists, says Bill Bonner.

The biggest credit bubble in history is due a correction, and there is little the Fed or Treasury can do to stop it. The more they try, the more money they have to print.

This makes the outlook for the dollar and US Treasury bonds ever more perilous… and the outlook for gold ever more attractive.

This from The Daily Reckoning:

There’s a war going on…a battle between a natural market correction…and an artificial attempt to avoid it. On the one hand, Mr. Market wants to correct the excesses of the boom/bubble period that began in 1982. On the other, Misters Bernanke and Paulson want to prevent him. Mr. Market takes down asset prices. Mr. Market …