Nice to see my old pal Joel Kotkin on CNBC trying to counter the talking points of Mayor Smoothie concerning a possible L.A. bankruptcy (Villaraigosa's CNBC interview is over at LAO). Willy-nilly layoffs are clearly not the answer - actually, if you read the LAT story this morning, the process of who stays and goes is already turning into a joke. As Kotkin points out, the city is drowning in pension obligations that have been piling up over the years, thanks to public employee unions that practically run the city. And as was true for GM, there's nowhere near enough money to cover everybody.

"Caifornia and Los Angeles are joined at the hip with many of the same kinds of problems and they're both sinking into the swamp deeper and deeper."