Just when I think I have heard it all, they come up with something even more eye-poppingly incredible. That's right folks. First they sucked you into the dot-com boom; then wiped out your tech stocks. Next they urged you to buy houses with money you couldn't pay back -- and those houses plunged in value while the global stock markets lost half their value -- further decimating your net worth.

Now they want to give you the once in a lifetime opportunity to buy the very toxic waste that is sinking the entire global financial system. And if you have a job in state government, your pension fund may be enticed into this financial sludge as well.

Have we reached the bottom yet? That's a question that people ask me from time to time. I haven't got an answer yet, but today I have some numbers that may give us an idea. And the preliminary verdict is: No!

Why? Because the commercial banking industry in the U.S. is likely to be bankrupt -- by which I mean its liabilities could exceed its assets -- as we approach the bottom.

Just how bad will it get? It could see 41% of its core capital wiped out by loan losses alone. And when you take into account all the toxic waste and derivatives on the banks' books -- its capital looks mighty thin.

On Monday, the stock market rose 498 points -- a move that many attributed to the announcement over the weekend of a plan to buy $1 trillion in toxic waste that uses government loans to lure investors -- such as hedge funds -- into buying extremely risky securities.

That sounds like the same thing that got us into the financial crisis in the first place. It also sounds like the sort of thing that hedge funds do for a living -- and those hedge funds are making a handful of skilled people into billionaires.

Since last October, I have been repeatedly suggesting that the U.S. would be better off creating new banks rather than putting capital into zombie banks -- whose financial toxic waste prevents them from lending. This is the fifth time I have made the suggestion -- I previously posted on it here, here, here, and here. Until today, I had no idea whether anyone was listening. Now I have a hunch that at least one person might have gotten wind of the idea -- maybe he listened to this radio interview last month on KCRW.

That one person is none other than Paul Romer, an economist at Stanford's Institute for Economic Policy Research. Yesterday Romer wrote in the Wall Street Journal that the U.S. needs banks that can lend and that it would be easier for that to happen if we put TARP money into new banks rather than trying to use the money to revive the zombie ones.

Tonight Jim Cramer on CNBC's MAD MONEY said he loves garbage and waste, because we can't stop producing them. Cramer loves toxic waste stocks because of permits needed and barriers to entry, plus longer profitability than regular waste companies that act as cyclicals.

His top pick in the sector on November 11 was Stericycle (SRCL), which is up 20% since and is still his favorite. He said they have the medical waste arena and have been acquiring mom-and-pop medical waste companies around the U.S. Here are the rest of his notes on it.

The first waste management company that he started discussing was American Ecology (ECOL), which he likes because of its emphasis on radioactive and toxic waste. ECOL ran 4% after Cramer noted it. Here are his full notes on ECOL.

Cramer said in a call-in that a big traditional waste company like Waste Management (WMI) trades more like a cyclical sector now. Cramer also said in a call-in that he has been waiting to get Ecolab (ECL), but that it has never given any sort of pullback that made the valuations worthwhile (he wants a big drop in it to be able to buy it).

Jon C. Ogg