Years ago I had the differential in my truck leak oil while I was driving and when the oil level got low enough the gears overheated, seized up, and exploded. I was lucky that the road was empty because it was late at night, no one hit me, and the massive peices of (probably) sharp metal didn't hit anyone.
The thing that scares me is that the credit markets act a lot like a differential for the ecconomy, the low level of liquidity in the market is a lot like oil that has drained from that differential, and there are obvious signs that it is overheating and is readly to seize up. The bailout plan is not that good, and represents something similar to diverting oil from the engine towards the differential ... In the short run it will buy you time to turn off at a service station to fix the problem, but if you don't use the time it buys you correctly you will have a problem where your engine and differential start to seize up at the same time.
