Cramer: How the Post-Lehman World Is Better

This week and next, the TheStreet and RealMoney will be exploring the aftermath of Lehman Brothers' bankruptcy filing and the ensuing market chaos it brought to a head almost a year ago. This story originally appeared Wednesday on RealMoney. Click here for a free trial, and enjoy incisive commentary all day, every day.

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Hardly a day goes by where I don't struggle with being defensive about the action in this market. On the eve of the anniversary of Lehman Brothers' demise, however, perhaps it is worth discussing whether we have returned to a world of normalcy, without inflation, where people either can't spend or don't want to spend beyond their means and the government is stymied to where it might not be able to spend further beyond its means.

Of course, each cohort has already spent too much. Consumers bought homes, retail and autos they couldn't afford, and government at all levels -- federal, state and local -- spent too much, too, as Doug Kass has so eloquently pointed out.

But the truth here is that the shadow lending system that was willing to securitize anything, even the worst of loans, and was willing to bundle anything in the hopes of getting compliant ratings agencies to bless the junk -- and bless they did for big fees -- has crashed into oblivion. Sure, the Federal Reserve has tried to revive some asset-backed lending, and asset-backed lending had been a pretty good game for years before standards grew lax, but there is no doubt that standards are no longer lax.

In short, we could be headed toward a world where real growth is dear while phony, debt-charged growth is history. We could be in a world where private equity may have come through unscathed but is no longer an important part of the landscape because people don't want their debt, regardless of the ratings. In fact, the ratings agencies alone may have been so tarnished that now buyers have to think for themselves, another positive of the era. I do hope that Moody's(MCO Quote) and Standard & Poor's do not get First Amendment protection, but I think the Southern District's ruling against the use of First Amendment protection sounds pretty specious. Private-party dissemination and a lack of so-called broadcast seem like pretty slim reeds upon which to hang a decision. Nevertheless, the agencies' sham ratings have been exposed, and anyone who relies upon them now will be stigmatized as an unworthy fiduciary.