Throwing Money to the Wind

What a mess this country is in. It's not all this country though, it's countries around the world. The economic situation is pretty bad all over. There are many countries where it's worse than it is in the United States. In a lot of other countries people and police are protesting and battling in the streets. Thinking back to hurricane Katrina, it really does not take long for all for lawlessness to break out when society starts to fall apart. We are learning that there are many different ways a society can fall apart too.

In Katrina it was the lack of services because they were knocked out from the storm. No electricity, no power for lights cooking, security, or most importantly refrigerators, because of no refrigeration people ran out of food very quickly. Because of no electricity for refrigeration stores didn't have food either, trucks could not bring in food and supplies because of the flooding. Hunger is a really powerful motivator. If you don't have food, you are going to try to get it one way or another even if you have to steal it and if it gets bad enough, to kill for it. Another drive that overrides all else is survival for your self and loved ones, if you or your love ones need medical supplies you are going to do everything in your power to see that they get the help they need.

Other causes of society breakdown is when the government breaks down. When this happens individuals and small groups start taking things into their own hands, and nothing is off the table when survival is at stake. Money can be another reason for a breakdown of a society, either too much of it, or too little of it, either way it leads to eventually not being able to afford the basic necessities. There are numerous other ways that a society breaks down including racism, difference in moral standards, religion, to much of a gap between the haves and the have nots.

The U.S. government has decided to throw money at the situation. First it was the financial institutions. It was decided that it would take at least $700 billion to set these Wall Street businesses right. I think giving out any money for them was a mistake. I did not agree with bailing them out in the first place and I am even more convinced that my thoughts were correct now that half of the $700 billion has been distributed.

I knew when the Bush Administration first came out with this plan that it was going to be no good. They first wanted the money to dole out with no restrictions, no oversight, and no legal or financial accountability. President Bush just wanted that amount to give to Mr. Paulson from the treasury to hand out to whichever companies or institutions he saw fit to do with whatever he thought would help the economy. Luckily, or maybe not depending on your opinion, Congress got involved and decided that they would need to have some oversight and not just cut Mr. Paulson a blank check. After some hemming and hawing they came up with a bill to give half the money to Mr. Paulson and have some oversight and restrictions on top executive salaries and bonuses. The whole idea of the plan was that Mr. Paulson would use the money to buy troubled mortgages and when the price of real estate recovered the mortgages could be sold for a profit and the money paid back to taxpayers where it was going to come from in the first place. When the bill went to the president he wouldn't agree unless there was one line stating that institutions that had their mortgages bought up would have to abide by the rules in the bill. Funny thing though, after getting Congress's approval for the $350 billion Mr. Paulson decided on his own not to buy up troubled mortgages. Instead he decided to just inject the money into the companies by buying stock in their companies and because of the line Bush made sure was in the bill, it pretty much voided any restrictions or oversight as to how the bailout money would be spent. It wasn't long before Bush and Mr. Paulson were on television pleading with the institutions to use the money given them to loosen up more money for lending, but of course there wasn't much they could do except plea at that point. Now if the economy gets even worse and these companies that we have bailed out go under what will their stock be worth, nada, just what the American people will get back from bailing out these companies. By the time the economy straightens out these companies have a good chance of being liquidated or will change hands and their original owners will be on to the next big thing, or perhaps starting new financial companies and there will be no entity to pay the tax payer back.

Next in the line of people wanting the government to bail them out was the big three auto manufacturers. Executives from the big three flew their private charter jets to Washington to ask for their share only to be mocked for flying their private jets into town. After a stern scolding from Congress the executives were sent home without a deal with the instructions to come back after they show how they would tighten their belts and restructure their companies so they could compete with the non union car manufactures in the United States and foreign car manufacturing companies. After what happened with the bailout money given financial institutions it looked like Congress was maybe getting smarter, but Bush stepped in and after scaring the big three talking about maybe letting them have a controlled bankruptcy decided that he would bail out Detroit with some money from the $700 billion gotten to prop up the financial institutions.

We should have never started giving money away. I believe that we are going to hit bottom anyway the only difference is that we are going to have at least $700 billion less when the dust clears. The free market system is supposed to be that, a free market. The financial institutions at least would have never took such chances if they weren't counting on the government bailing them out if it hit the fan. The auto companies have been fighting all the way of having higher mpg standards and alternative energy autos, the very issues they will have to address if they are to be able to compete with foreign auto manufacturers.

We started down a slippery slope now that we started giving money away. In the past weeks I have heard of many other big businesses jumping up shouting that they too will need government bailout money to keep their workers working and their companies above water too. There are many voices calling out for money because they are all thinking, "Well if they are bailing out them guys I should be able to get something too." How many more companies can we not afford to bail out? I think this is a big mistake, it's like throwing money to the wind.