I confess, my first reaction to news of the problems at Silicon Valley Bank was a smirk.
It was hard not to relish the sight of tech libertarians, the very people who insist that regulations are a deadweight on innovation, demanding government intervention to save their bank. Once again, devout capitalists were insisting on the privatization of profits and the socialization of losses.
My schadenfreude was soon tempered by the realization that SVB was a special bank and there are legitimate reasons — a fair number of them associated with national security — to jump in and save it, or at least its customers.