Unlike The Who song in the 70s, that states, "we won't get fooled again", it is instead, "we continue to get fooled again".
Remember that $700 billion bail out package for Wall Street financial companies that was supposed to free up money from bad debts for lending to get the economy back rolling? With most of the first half of that money gone or spoken for, it didn't work. A week ago a lame duck president got up on national television and pleaded with financial institutions not to hold on to that money to shore up their financial situation, or buy other failing institutions, but to use it for lending like it was intended. It looks like the original plan which was to buy up "bad" mortgages and eventually sell them at a later date paying back taxpayers when the housing market was higher wasn't really considered too hard to start with. Instead of buying failed mortgages, setting some kind of stipulations on how the money was spent or used to insure that the taxpayer could be paid off, the administration decided that we would just buy up the worthless pieces of paper called stocks from companies that no one else would ever in their right mind buy, because the companies are failing in the first place. It looks like Bush get's his money for his big business buddies one way or another. Now that almost half the money is gone, and they can't get banks to loosen up money for lending, the government is thinking about maybe starting to give the second half of the money to directly help homeowners, let's hope that they come up with a few better rules for regulating that half of bailout money.
Talk about redistribution of wealth? How are the bailed out or soon to be bailed out institutions reacting to the economy downturn? They are paying bonuses in the area of $230,000 to employees making base salaries of $400,000. Makes perfect sense to me. After your upper management loses all your money resulting that your company needs to be bailed out by the taxpayers, your management people need hundreds of thousands of dollars of bonuses to know they are appreciated. What?!! Yes during house hearings I heard that these institutions were paying up to a million dollars a month to people who weren't even working at the company anymore, but who were held on on retainer because the companies were afraid that these people would spill their trade secrets with their competitors. Trade secrets??? Mr. Big Business, you are broke, what is it about your company procedures would anyone want or value? Gee what would these trade secrets be? Something like, "How to Bankrupt Your Company and Get Bailed Out by the Government"? Or maybe, "Screw Your Company and Get a Million a Month for Not Working". And while those guys who make 400 thousand dollars a year and bonuses of 230 thousand dollars are getting paid by the American taxpayer if, God forbid, that taxpayer gets a 1 thousand dollar tax break, it is an evil wealth redistribution plot that will bankrupt the top 1-2% of Americans. While you are thinking about that, think about just how much that health plan or education, or disability is such a drain on society compared to them guys pulling in $600,000 dollars plus a year at your expense.
This is not even touching on all the taxpayer money going towards the war in Iraq or money going to other governments that are fighting wars for us. What about all the money going to the company Dick Cheney has ties to that supplies the instruments of destruction to support the wars around the globe. I bet that is another company that isn't feeling the pinch of the bad economy, the only company other than big oil. It isn't chance that in the movies Batman and Spiderman that more than one multimillionaire's fortune was built up using money from the arms industry, kind of like art reflects reality.
I have a bit of news for them politicians. The market is failing and stalled because the common man, the one that's not in the top 2% of income earners, doesn't have any money to spend on things that aren't absolutely necessary. Hell most of them don't have the money to spend on the things that are necessary. That what happens when you cater to the top 1-2% of the people who make the most, they divvy things up to make the most out of everyone else until everyone else don't have the money to keep the economy going.
These things should make you mad as hell. They should make you want to hold people, corporations, and administrations accountable for the mistakes that make and especially when they do things that either are illegal or should be illegal. The Bush/Cheney administration needs to be held accountable for their deeds while in office, they surely didn't protect the constitution that they swore to protect. They started wars where we had no business, screwed up the economy for their buddies gain, went against Geneva conventions and international law. The first step to fixing things is to find and admit where things went wrong to get to this time in space that we are in, and take steps that these things do not ever have the chance to happen again. Impeach Bush/Cheney. Then prosecute them.
Thursday, November 13, 2008
Sunday, November 9, 2008
Bailing Out Automobile Manufacturers
Well we have been helping all other big businesses and industries, so now the automobile manufacturers want to get in the act too. I mean after all we have been giving the oil industry tax breaks and making it possible for them to record record profits for two quarters in a row even though the rest the country is in financial chaos. We are rewarding the banking and financial industry hundreds of billions for their ungodly salaries, greed and waste. It's only fair for the government (the American tax payers) to turn around and bail out the automobile manufacturers. These are companies who have resisted all the mpg mandates that the government tried to impose on them to make their cars better for the environment and more completable with foreign imports. They have been pushing bigger and bigger SUVs and even most their other car models are getting on average less mpg than they did 10 years ago. The people in the rest of the world have been shaking their heads at us Americans in disgust as we zip around in our gas guzzling SUVs Why has the auto industry push these dinosaurs of responsible automotive design? They make the highest profit margin on the SUVs and they can get around some of the environmental and safety requirements, so in other words greed. So now because the auto industry also hire a large number of people that are making ungodly amounts of money, we are supposed to bail them out for their refusal to make autos that can compete with cars designed overseas.
There are reasons that bailing out the auto industry is as stupid as the breaks we have been giving the oil and banking industries. As mentioned above, The government has been trying to push regulations for higher mpg, which would have made the American companies more competitive against foreign companies and would have forced companies to make more smaller and mid sized autos instead of huge SUVs that according to advertisements they push as something people just got to have. Many of the American automotive companies are tied in with foreign companies to make cars in Europe that would fit the bill for suddenly economy minded American consumers, Some of the foreign manufacturers make cars in the U.S. to sell in the U.S. aren't these basically cars made in America? The automotive manufacturer's will have no better use of the money than the banking industry. The president was just on the TV pleading with the banking industry to not sit on, or invest in acquiring other defunct banks with the money that was given them from the government to free up money for lending, the auto industry will probably not put that money into retooling like it would be meant to used, instead they will probably use it to pump up their worth and pay their shareholders and executives as they wait out the crunch while waiting for a better time to again push SUVs back at the American public.
The biggest fear by oil companies both abroad and at home is that the American public start conserving oil enough it will drive the prices way down. We have already made Saudi government nervous because we have been conservative and it has drove down prices. One of the best things we could do for our country is wean ourselves from foreign oil. If American car manufacturers made smaller cars with better mpg it would tend to drive the cost of oil down even more reducing our dependence on oil from parts of the countries that aren't necessarily friends of ours. In a way if we bail out the auto manufacturers, we are enabling them to make bigger cars that drive more of our energy dollars overseas.
Most of all if we are to have unregulated capitalism we have to allow the market fall on big industries and institutions that continue to do stupid things for greed, if the banking institutions weren't thinking the government would bail them out they would have never took such chances or paid their administration people so well. It's the same way with the auto industry, if they wouldn't have got lost in their greed of high markup SUVs they would have been concentrating on building competitive energy efficient vehicles. They would still be hit by the economic situation that our country is in, but they wouldn't have set themselves up for the loss of business to car manufacturers who have already retooled to make energy efficient vehicles long ago.
There are reasons that bailing out the auto industry is as stupid as the breaks we have been giving the oil and banking industries. As mentioned above, The government has been trying to push regulations for higher mpg, which would have made the American companies more competitive against foreign companies and would have forced companies to make more smaller and mid sized autos instead of huge SUVs that according to advertisements they push as something people just got to have. Many of the American automotive companies are tied in with foreign companies to make cars in Europe that would fit the bill for suddenly economy minded American consumers, Some of the foreign manufacturers make cars in the U.S. to sell in the U.S. aren't these basically cars made in America? The automotive manufacturer's will have no better use of the money than the banking industry. The president was just on the TV pleading with the banking industry to not sit on, or invest in acquiring other defunct banks with the money that was given them from the government to free up money for lending, the auto industry will probably not put that money into retooling like it would be meant to used, instead they will probably use it to pump up their worth and pay their shareholders and executives as they wait out the crunch while waiting for a better time to again push SUVs back at the American public.
The biggest fear by oil companies both abroad and at home is that the American public start conserving oil enough it will drive the prices way down. We have already made Saudi government nervous because we have been conservative and it has drove down prices. One of the best things we could do for our country is wean ourselves from foreign oil. If American car manufacturers made smaller cars with better mpg it would tend to drive the cost of oil down even more reducing our dependence on oil from parts of the countries that aren't necessarily friends of ours. In a way if we bail out the auto manufacturers, we are enabling them to make bigger cars that drive more of our energy dollars overseas.
Most of all if we are to have unregulated capitalism we have to allow the market fall on big industries and institutions that continue to do stupid things for greed, if the banking institutions weren't thinking the government would bail them out they would have never took such chances or paid their administration people so well. It's the same way with the auto industry, if they wouldn't have got lost in their greed of high markup SUVs they would have been concentrating on building competitive energy efficient vehicles. They would still be hit by the economic situation that our country is in, but they wouldn't have set themselves up for the loss of business to car manufacturers who have already retooled to make energy efficient vehicles long ago.
Friday, November 7, 2008
Obama Wins Election
It's been three days since Barack Obama won the presidential election in the U.S.A. I think it's great that the people in United States has come so far as to elect a black man for president. For a country that has been labeled as a mixing pot it has taken a while for this to happen, I for one am not intimidated by the fact that our new president isn't a white man. I think it's about time. Our country has been built by immigrants and people of all colors it's about time that our highest office in the land reflects this. In the past I think we as a people have been pretty hypocritical as we are all immigrants in this land that was taken from the true owners, the American Indian. We have been often called the land of the free, but we have a sorted past for dealing with people who are not white. The American Indian was pushed across their land and eventually put on reservations. Many Chinese helped build the first railroads connecting the west to the east coasts, but they get a small paragraph in history for their accomplishments, the Japanese were rounded up during WWII and placed in concentration camps because powerful white men in power didn't trust them. As recent as after the 9/11 bombings Arabs have been subject to heightened scrutiny and harassment, maybe now we can, as a country, get past the color of a person's skin. To be a really great country we must provide opportunities for all people not just for people of a certain race. I think Barack Obama will be a person that can understand how to deal with these issues without trying to go overboard to correct past injustices or cater to tip the balances in favor of just blacks. Our country has many problems and issues that need to be addressed as soon as possible I hope and pray that he is up to the task, I believe he is. Congratulations Barack Obama.
Saturday, October 25, 2008
Hope and Broken Promises
It's less than a 10 days until the final presidential elections in the U.S. At this point it looks like Obama is favored to win, but as was the case in 2000 and 2004, we know that it's not over until the fat lady sings. It will be interesting to see if the Republicans will continue to steal the election like they had in 2000 and 2004 they are surely going to try, after being successful the last two elections it is hard to believe that it will be a clean election this year, but we can hope.
America deserves better than what it has been getting for leadership the last eight years. The last eight years have been filled with scandals and illegalities of and from the Bush administration. First the Republicans steal the elections and put and keep in office a puppet that has been one of the worse in history for America, and then he has continued to commit crimes against the American people and the world community, so far with impunity of being held accountable. History will record this time as one of the darkest times in American politics for Americans and the view held of Americans around the world. We have lost our reputation we have had in the world as champions of what's right and fair and the defender of the down trodden. In a way I'm glad that I haven't been fortunate enough to travel the world, because I'm embarrassed of what it has become to be an American. We have a nasty reputation with the rest of the world and frankly we deserve it. No matter who wins the bid for the White House it is our duty to demand from them actions that will improve our image in the world and address the failures of the past.
For people who know me, it is no surprise that I don't hold any hope that a Republican will be one to fix what's wrong with America, what might surprise them is I also don't hold much hope that a Democrat will either. It's fine and dandy to claim that it's the American people who are accountable for the failure of the government to be fair and honest and address the problems of our country and our image in the world, but it would be a false claim. These last few years I think the American public has called for the right things to be done in government but short of starting a revolution their pleads have been falling on deaf ears of the occupants of both major parties. Two years ago the public voted mostly for Democrats who promised to end the war in Iraq and hold the administration accountable for it's crimes, it didn't happen.
I don't share the belief of Republicans that we can blame all the problems that have came to a head these last couple of years on the Democratic majority in Congress. For one thing, the biggest, the Democrats have held the majority, but they didn't hold a 2/3rds majority that it would have taken to push bills to address the burning issues through the House and Senate to overturn the president's veto. I do believe, as I think many other people do, that the Democrats caved in too easily to the demands of the president and his Republican party. Democrats for the most part are afraid to hold there ground over fears that they will lose the support of the American people and they will get voted out of office. I'm not sure what could be more a sign of support as they got from the last election where Americans voted almost entirely to put Democratic leaders in any open spot they could to represent them. The Democrats promised to hold the administration accountable for it's illegal activities and get us out of an expensive illegal war in Iraq that was approved for under false pretenses. Once in office though the Democrats developed the jitters to do anything decisive fearing their re-elections. Time and time again they would make a stand only to cave in later to the demands of the administration and Republicans, the Democrats had no balls.
Although I may be disheartened by the Democrats, I totally disagree with the Republican's agenda and views on how the government should be run. How many times in history do we have to have proven to us that trickle down economics does not work? Those who don't learn from the mistakes in history are destined to repeat them same mistakes, again, and again, and again. I think that trickle down economics was ever really intended to work for the common people, it's more of an instrument for the greed of the rich to get richer. Lets face it, our country has always been lead by a small handful of the super rich and famous, and they don't make a point of giving away power or money. Sure, if you know anyone who has a lot of money, I mean a really lot of money, they will say that they give to charity, and/or that they support various groups to help the unfortunate, but would they pay their workers a fair wage so that they are not the unfortunate ones? No. When they defend their wages and profits it's supporting their families, but when a common person uses the same argument for needing more money, the well to do claim it's not their problem that their workers have large families to support. To the elite, the common man is still looked down upon as breeding stock to replenish their workforce, a commodity to be managed to keep us high enough in numbers to ensure a cheap workforce without being too high in numbers so as to risk an revolt and a risk of the toppling of their empires.
This election we have two of the major parties claiming to represent change, will either one of the follow through on it? I really doubt it, not the way or intensity they hope or we need anyway.
America deserves better than what it has been getting for leadership the last eight years. The last eight years have been filled with scandals and illegalities of and from the Bush administration. First the Republicans steal the elections and put and keep in office a puppet that has been one of the worse in history for America, and then he has continued to commit crimes against the American people and the world community, so far with impunity of being held accountable. History will record this time as one of the darkest times in American politics for Americans and the view held of Americans around the world. We have lost our reputation we have had in the world as champions of what's right and fair and the defender of the down trodden. In a way I'm glad that I haven't been fortunate enough to travel the world, because I'm embarrassed of what it has become to be an American. We have a nasty reputation with the rest of the world and frankly we deserve it. No matter who wins the bid for the White House it is our duty to demand from them actions that will improve our image in the world and address the failures of the past.
For people who know me, it is no surprise that I don't hold any hope that a Republican will be one to fix what's wrong with America, what might surprise them is I also don't hold much hope that a Democrat will either. It's fine and dandy to claim that it's the American people who are accountable for the failure of the government to be fair and honest and address the problems of our country and our image in the world, but it would be a false claim. These last few years I think the American public has called for the right things to be done in government but short of starting a revolution their pleads have been falling on deaf ears of the occupants of both major parties. Two years ago the public voted mostly for Democrats who promised to end the war in Iraq and hold the administration accountable for it's crimes, it didn't happen.
I don't share the belief of Republicans that we can blame all the problems that have came to a head these last couple of years on the Democratic majority in Congress. For one thing, the biggest, the Democrats have held the majority, but they didn't hold a 2/3rds majority that it would have taken to push bills to address the burning issues through the House and Senate to overturn the president's veto. I do believe, as I think many other people do, that the Democrats caved in too easily to the demands of the president and his Republican party. Democrats for the most part are afraid to hold there ground over fears that they will lose the support of the American people and they will get voted out of office. I'm not sure what could be more a sign of support as they got from the last election where Americans voted almost entirely to put Democratic leaders in any open spot they could to represent them. The Democrats promised to hold the administration accountable for it's illegal activities and get us out of an expensive illegal war in Iraq that was approved for under false pretenses. Once in office though the Democrats developed the jitters to do anything decisive fearing their re-elections. Time and time again they would make a stand only to cave in later to the demands of the administration and Republicans, the Democrats had no balls.
Although I may be disheartened by the Democrats, I totally disagree with the Republican's agenda and views on how the government should be run. How many times in history do we have to have proven to us that trickle down economics does not work? Those who don't learn from the mistakes in history are destined to repeat them same mistakes, again, and again, and again. I think that trickle down economics was ever really intended to work for the common people, it's more of an instrument for the greed of the rich to get richer. Lets face it, our country has always been lead by a small handful of the super rich and famous, and they don't make a point of giving away power or money. Sure, if you know anyone who has a lot of money, I mean a really lot of money, they will say that they give to charity, and/or that they support various groups to help the unfortunate, but would they pay their workers a fair wage so that they are not the unfortunate ones? No. When they defend their wages and profits it's supporting their families, but when a common person uses the same argument for needing more money, the well to do claim it's not their problem that their workers have large families to support. To the elite, the common man is still looked down upon as breeding stock to replenish their workforce, a commodity to be managed to keep us high enough in numbers to ensure a cheap workforce without being too high in numbers so as to risk an revolt and a risk of the toppling of their empires.
This election we have two of the major parties claiming to represent change, will either one of the follow through on it? I really doubt it, not the way or intensity they hope or we need anyway.
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
The Great American Rip Off
By now, even if you live in a hole, you should have heard about and are hearing about United States' and the world's financial crisis. Within the last couple of weeks our President has got on the boob tube and pleaded with Congress and the American people for a $700 billion bailout for the fat cats of Wall Street. This had to be done as soon as possible meaning days, not weeks, giving no time to have hearings or research what the problem was, what caused it, or what would be the best way to go about trying to fix the economy.
Within days of Congress agreeing to spend $850 billion on the financial rescue (bailout), there has been hearings with the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform where we are learning that high executives and CEOs of Wall Street financial companies have left these companies with hundreds of millions of dollars that were paid to them, some of these fat cats were paid such amounts as a million of dollars per month having them on retainers. On top of the already tens of millions they were already getting, they took home millions of dollars in bonus or a form of severance, or retirement packages. Then as some at the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform heard yesterday and the day before, even as taxpayers were bailing these companies out, some such as AIG were holding week long events at posh hotels that charged up to $100,000.00 a night for rooms, spending $440,000.00 for these events.
I'm sure that the American tax payers are just happy that their representitives voted to bailout these Wall Street companies at the cost of over $2300 for every man woman and child to save companies that paid their officers hundreds of billions in salaries and bonuses as they left their jobs before pleading to the American people to bail them out. There are many families that live on under $20,000 a year, it is just wrong that some of these guys were making a million a month, no one is worth that much.
Within days of Congress agreeing to spend $850 billion on the financial rescue (bailout), there has been hearings with the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform where we are learning that high executives and CEOs of Wall Street financial companies have left these companies with hundreds of millions of dollars that were paid to them, some of these fat cats were paid such amounts as a million of dollars per month having them on retainers. On top of the already tens of millions they were already getting, they took home millions of dollars in bonus or a form of severance, or retirement packages. Then as some at the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform heard yesterday and the day before, even as taxpayers were bailing these companies out, some such as AIG were holding week long events at posh hotels that charged up to $100,000.00 a night for rooms, spending $440,000.00 for these events.
I'm sure that the American tax payers are just happy that their representitives voted to bailout these Wall Street companies at the cost of over $2300 for every man woman and child to save companies that paid their officers hundreds of billions in salaries and bonuses as they left their jobs before pleading to the American people to bail them out. There are many families that live on under $20,000 a year, it is just wrong that some of these guys were making a million a month, no one is worth that much.
Monday, September 29, 2008
Bailing Out Wall Street
It's the politicians that just don't get it, or maybe they did but they decided to milk any available money they could from the populace any way. Let's look at it in a different way.
Say I buy a car from a dealer, the dealer wants to make big money off me so the price has been jacked up to the point where it is really over-valued. I drive it off the lot and it's price devalues a couple of thousand dollars, but that's not all. It turns out that the car is a real lemon requiring lots of money to be constantly stuck into it to keep it running, it gets to the point where I can not afford to keep the car because it has ate up all my money keeping it running, and if I sell it I will have to take a big loss because I can not recoup what I have stuck into it. Eventually I lose my job cause my car is not dependable and I'm late too often.
But it's not just my car with these problems, it's everyone's that has bought this particular make and model. Eventually word gets out and everyone quits buying this particular make and model. The dealer, having bought this make and model in huge numbers, even though he knew of the car's short comings, because he figured that he could make the most money from selling such high priced cars, is now stuck with a lot full of them and they are not selling. The dealer now is losing money and decides to file for bankruptcy. The government now steps in and says, "Oh this is bad, this dealer is really going to lose money and probably will have to go out of business. He will have to lay off mechanics, sales people, other people working in the office all of which have benefited from the high price of the car and the high commissions. This is going to have an effect on everyone, the people at the car washes, the people selling gas, people who sell tires and service, not to mention all the people who get money from the dealer and his employees like when they go to the bar, grocery store, buys a house, etc. We have to do something to protect the dealer's interests because it will affect all these other people and wreck the economy."
So the government comes up with the idea of collecting money from all the broke people who have been taken by the dealer's bad cars and they give that money to the dealer so that he can stay in business selling over priced crappy cars to other unsuspecting customers. At the same time the government, even though they know the car is over-valued and crappy, doesn't do anything for me, the person who is stuck with an expensive car that is not worth anything. This does nothing to make my car not a lemon, it doesn't get my job back, and it doesn't get my money back from all the repairs etc.
The dealer has a big fancy home, vacation home, mobile home, boats, ATVs, cars, SUVs, eats out a lot, gets paid vacations, and bonuses. I am stuck, broke from making repairs, no job, no 401s, and no running car........
Ok, it's maybe not quite the same thing, but in many ways it is. Wall Street has got itself in a bind. It's not because they didn't know it was coming, it was because everyone thought they could make their ungodly profits and get back out before the shit hit the fan. The financial people in Wall Street knew this, the president of the United States knew this, but everyone thought they'd be long gone before the ship went down, or maybe they figured that the government would not allow them to fail and bail them out. The president thought that he'd be out of office before the pumped up markets fail and he would leaving this mess on the next president (most likely a Democrat) and then the Republicans could use it against them in the next election. The failing market happened a bit too early, so now the Bush Administration comes up with this plan to give the very people who took advantage of deregulation to gouge the American public 700 billion dollars, from the very people that were taken advantage of, so that they can stay in business as usual.
This 700 dollar bailout does nothing to cure the problem at hand. All it will do is bring the market back up temporarily to give share holders a chance to get their money back and jump ship. After the share holders jump ship the country will be back to this same spot it is in now, except that the tax payers will be 700 dollars poorer. I believe that we need to demand from our leaders to let the market adjust itself back to responsible financial policies and reinstate regulations to keep this from happening again.
Say I buy a car from a dealer, the dealer wants to make big money off me so the price has been jacked up to the point where it is really over-valued. I drive it off the lot and it's price devalues a couple of thousand dollars, but that's not all. It turns out that the car is a real lemon requiring lots of money to be constantly stuck into it to keep it running, it gets to the point where I can not afford to keep the car because it has ate up all my money keeping it running, and if I sell it I will have to take a big loss because I can not recoup what I have stuck into it. Eventually I lose my job cause my car is not dependable and I'm late too often.
But it's not just my car with these problems, it's everyone's that has bought this particular make and model. Eventually word gets out and everyone quits buying this particular make and model. The dealer, having bought this make and model in huge numbers, even though he knew of the car's short comings, because he figured that he could make the most money from selling such high priced cars, is now stuck with a lot full of them and they are not selling. The dealer now is losing money and decides to file for bankruptcy. The government now steps in and says, "Oh this is bad, this dealer is really going to lose money and probably will have to go out of business. He will have to lay off mechanics, sales people, other people working in the office all of which have benefited from the high price of the car and the high commissions. This is going to have an effect on everyone, the people at the car washes, the people selling gas, people who sell tires and service, not to mention all the people who get money from the dealer and his employees like when they go to the bar, grocery store, buys a house, etc. We have to do something to protect the dealer's interests because it will affect all these other people and wreck the economy."
So the government comes up with the idea of collecting money from all the broke people who have been taken by the dealer's bad cars and they give that money to the dealer so that he can stay in business selling over priced crappy cars to other unsuspecting customers. At the same time the government, even though they know the car is over-valued and crappy, doesn't do anything for me, the person who is stuck with an expensive car that is not worth anything. This does nothing to make my car not a lemon, it doesn't get my job back, and it doesn't get my money back from all the repairs etc.
The dealer has a big fancy home, vacation home, mobile home, boats, ATVs, cars, SUVs, eats out a lot, gets paid vacations, and bonuses. I am stuck, broke from making repairs, no job, no 401s, and no running car........
Ok, it's maybe not quite the same thing, but in many ways it is. Wall Street has got itself in a bind. It's not because they didn't know it was coming, it was because everyone thought they could make their ungodly profits and get back out before the shit hit the fan. The financial people in Wall Street knew this, the president of the United States knew this, but everyone thought they'd be long gone before the ship went down, or maybe they figured that the government would not allow them to fail and bail them out. The president thought that he'd be out of office before the pumped up markets fail and he would leaving this mess on the next president (most likely a Democrat) and then the Republicans could use it against them in the next election. The failing market happened a bit too early, so now the Bush Administration comes up with this plan to give the very people who took advantage of deregulation to gouge the American public 700 billion dollars, from the very people that were taken advantage of, so that they can stay in business as usual.
This 700 dollar bailout does nothing to cure the problem at hand. All it will do is bring the market back up temporarily to give share holders a chance to get their money back and jump ship. After the share holders jump ship the country will be back to this same spot it is in now, except that the tax payers will be 700 dollars poorer. I believe that we need to demand from our leaders to let the market adjust itself back to responsible financial policies and reinstate regulations to keep this from happening again.
Friday, September 12, 2008
Got Lipstick?
What a sad state of our times when we reduce the presidential elections from platforms from which to preach solutions to our country's biggest problems, to the point of arguing about lipstick on a pig. I kind of doubt that my life will change much either way whether that pig, or pit bull, has lipstick or not.
I think that there are many more, more important issues than lipstick on a pig. Maybe the legalities of fighting a war in Iraq, illegal wiretapping, with holding and destroying evidence before they can be subpoenaed, picking people off the street in foreign countries without that country's knowledge or permission, keeping prisoners in foreign prisons, and we still don't know about the illegal firings of prosecutors or the big one, torture of prisoners in the war against terrorism. These are past failures of the present administration that no one wants to tackle.
Instead of lipstick on a pit bull or lipstick on a pig, why don't the candidates tell us about how they are going to tackle the problems we face in our government and the problems that are affecting the American people? I could give a rat's as* about lipstick on any kind of animal, doesn't strike my fancy, but apparently it's high on the Democrat and Republican list of important things that the American people need to know. How about letting me know how I'm going to afford to heat my house, or put gas in my car, how are they going to improve our infrastructure, how will we move into the future as a provider of high paying technology jobs in our own country instead of providing low paying jobs for people in third world countries? Apparently none of these things are very high on either candidates list as being important to the American people.
I would think that the first candidate that comes up with a workable budget plan for our country, the first candidate that speaks truth and shows out unfounded lies, the first candidate that promises to run the government openly in front of everyone for all to criticize and debate, that candidate should be our clear choice for president, not the candidate who tells the biggest or the most lies.
I think that there are many more, more important issues than lipstick on a pig. Maybe the legalities of fighting a war in Iraq, illegal wiretapping, with holding and destroying evidence before they can be subpoenaed, picking people off the street in foreign countries without that country's knowledge or permission, keeping prisoners in foreign prisons, and we still don't know about the illegal firings of prosecutors or the big one, torture of prisoners in the war against terrorism. These are past failures of the present administration that no one wants to tackle.
Instead of lipstick on a pit bull or lipstick on a pig, why don't the candidates tell us about how they are going to tackle the problems we face in our government and the problems that are affecting the American people? I could give a rat's as* about lipstick on any kind of animal, doesn't strike my fancy, but apparently it's high on the Democrat and Republican list of important things that the American people need to know. How about letting me know how I'm going to afford to heat my house, or put gas in my car, how are they going to improve our infrastructure, how will we move into the future as a provider of high paying technology jobs in our own country instead of providing low paying jobs for people in third world countries? Apparently none of these things are very high on either candidates list as being important to the American people.
I would think that the first candidate that comes up with a workable budget plan for our country, the first candidate that speaks truth and shows out unfounded lies, the first candidate that promises to run the government openly in front of everyone for all to criticize and debate, that candidate should be our clear choice for president, not the candidate who tells the biggest or the most lies.
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