IT’S THE BAILOUT, STUPID

So yesterday the Repulsicans stomped out of a meeting called by their own president because they were angry at being asked to reinstall the banking regulatory process and ensure that homeowners caught in the housing mortgage crunch don’t get burned. They were mad because the Democrats were getting their way and Bush was going along with it. What a bunch of Holy High Rollers. Clinton/Bush deregulation is the seat of the problem, and they either don’t see it, don’t care or don’t get it – pick one. Doesn’t matter which one you pick, of course, the result is the same – blockheaded politics as usual.

The other side of the aisle isn’t much better of course. The Democrats did get stand up for the regulatory process, protections for the mortgage holder, and some handslapping for the CEOs, but also completely overlooked the fact that this whole deal has been engineered by the administration as a means of sheltering private profits while making the public eat the losses.

Anyone treating this situation as anything other than a power play designed to keep power and riches in the hands of those who took us down the garden path in the first place is missing the point and setting the citizens of the country up for another, bigger fall down the road.

When I heard that the meeting had blown up my first thought was that the Democrats must have denounced the whole proposal for the sham it is. When I heard that it was the Republicans and what their reasons were and that the Democrats were ready to accept Bush’s capitulations to their demands and vote the thing in, it was all I could do to just slump in my chair and sigh. If any of our politicians are puzzled about why the people think they are a bunch of worthless louts, they should be able to look at what’s going on with this mess and figure it out in a New York minute.

Bill Clinton said it long ago – It’s the economy, stupid. He didn’t say enough though. It’s the way the economic system shafts the middle class, stupid. It the way Washington high rollers forget who they represent, stupid. It’s that CEOs earn 300 to 400 times as much as the average worker, stupid. It’s that short term gains have taken precedence over long term thinking since 1980, stupid. It’s that Congressfolk and Senators don’t believe that the man on the street can think, stupid.

But then again, whose the more stupid – the “leaders” who keep garnering more money and power to themselves or the people who keep voting for those “leaders” while they keep losing money and power? It’s all just stupid, stupid.

“Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!” – Patrick Henry


Be the change you wish to see in the world. -- M. K. Gandhi

The reason for going was to keep the crude flowing and raise a false flag abroad. – from a poem by Jack Evans titled 3500 Souls - http://www.myspace.com/paralegal_eagle

Individually we have little voice. Collectively we cannot be ignored.
But in silence we surrender our power. Yours in Peace -- BR