Okay, so there’s this economic crisis. Something has to be done. If something isn’t done immediately, then our children will turn green, our teeth will fall out, and worse, country will be in dire straights. (with the bail out looming I couldn’t resist using the name of the band who wrote Money for Nothin’)

At least that’s the impression I got when President Bush said that we had to do something IMMEDIATELY. Then nothing happened. So it became “we’ve got to get a plan implemented within the next few days”. There was no plan. Nothing happened. Over a week later we’re still trying to get a plan in place, yet our economy is still intact. How is that possible? I thought the sky was falling and we had to catch it.

Apparently some did. Just not in the way we thought they would.

WaMu went away. That wasn’t because they went under, but because so many people pulled out their money that they could no longer cover their debt. Other banks have been purchased by more solvent banks. The stock market has dropped severely, but the only people who have really lost money are those who have cashed out. There’s still a good possibility that the market could rebound. And didn’t those who invest in the market know that there was a risk associated with it? I learned that the hard way in 1987 when my stock dropped by 50% in one day.

What’s going on? Is it a coincidence that all of the major economic problems that we have faced in this country have happened during the tail-end of Republican administrations? Coolidge led us into the Great Depression, leaving it to first Hoover then FDR to clean up. Safeguards put into the system prevented a repeat during the Reagan years when the market crashed. Now Bush has done things so badly that even those safeguards aren’t enough. Do ya think that maybe it’s the philosophy that doesn’t work? Maybe?

The Republican stance during all of these administrations has been “business first”. Totally open free market and leave out any oversight or controls. Let the market do whatever it wants. It will adjust and take care of itself. Give money to the wealthy, take care of businesses and wealth will trickle down to everyone else in a shower of money.

Well how’s that workin’ for ya?

We’ve been trickled on all right, but it’s not the kind of golden shower we were promised. How about a new approach? Let the big boys deal with their own problems. Since we’re a government OF the People, BY the People and FOR the People, how about we help out (of all things) THE PEOPLE. Get money to the average person (see "my bail out plan" post), and as they are able to better take care of themselves the economy will strengthen. This will cause more demand, which will increase jobs, and the wealthy will make more money.

And after all, isn’t that what Republicans want out of their government?

Wealthy people love it when stock values plummet. It's buying time.

"We've been trickled on"...great line!

Anybody want to bet that while the stock market fell 7% yesterday, your 401Ks and other group investments will have fallen more like 20% or 30%?

It's sort of like gas prices ... oil goes up 5%, gas goes up 10% (when oil prices only make up about 50% at beast of the cost of gas) ... oil comes back down that 5%, your gas prices fall 5% (or less, and nowhere near as fast ad it went up.)

They cheat you going and coming ... every time.

oh, and notice that the markets are going up and down over this crisis period ... meaning those with the big money and favoured status on the markets are making a killing getting out while the markets are high, forcing a collapse so YOU lose the money, then getting back in big time so the markets sore upward again, costing YOU more to get in, then they repeat the cycle stealing more of YOUR money.

What a racket.

Exactly why I choose not to play.

Traders love this kind of market.

The fact that the market is going up today tells me those suckers don't need a friggin bail out. They'll be fine.



Put the money to work rebuilding the infrastructure, educating our children, universal health care, renewable energy, ....which will all stimulate the economy and put this country on the road to being a nation which produces something tangible, not just DEBT.

Screw the bailout of Wall Street.

The only ones that I've seen being affected by all of this are the salaries of CEO's that have a large part of their pay packages tied up in stock options.
Maybe the Bushyt Misadministration should come out with a story about how investment banks have developed weapons of mass destruction and are going to give them to Al Queda if we don't pay them their ransom demands.