Thanks to Professor Reynolds for pointing out this superlative piece by James Delong, in which he articulates in an article most of the things about which I've been fuming for the last three months. Fortunately (or not, if I can't get my butt into gear), there are still a few points to be made, or at least elaborated upon, at least in a quantitative sense, and I hope to be able to sort them out in the next few days, before going back to California.