I was meaning to post on this again a little sooner, but it suddenly took off and I wanted to think a little before I responded.

Quote - SAMS3D

the government....well that is no longer for the people, by the people...

I'm starting to agree with that.  When we have one party infighting about letting people's votes count in the primaries and a special interest group with possible ties to not only one of the canidates but also perhaps the sup-prime market being raided for voter fraud in one state and alleged to do the same in 10 others, that's not a good sign.

Going back to the bailout, I think if anything it should have gone to the people who are getting hurt by the market crash and not the banks who made bad business decisions.

Don, there are so many lobbiest in washington now because companies are using the government to kneecap one another.  Microsoft had virtually no lobbiests in DC until they got taken to court for being a monopoly, then they had a ton of lobbiests.  A sad fact in life is the squeaky wheel often gets the grease, since washtington is giving out grease, there are now a ton of squeaky wheels.  You have to have people there to prevent your competitors from running amok.  Trim back on the frivilious lawsuits and keep the federal government restricted in its role and you'll see that decline. 

Klebnor, good post.  I tend to agree with what you said.  The only thing I'd like to say is while the actions for creating this mess were on public display, few people took note of it because certain people in the media weren't doing their job at the time.   However I think that this sudden crash took everyone by surprise.  During the conventions, no one was talking about the economy.  Next thing we know, two banks were bailed out and a third went bankrupt.

Quote - Paganartist

The ideals that gave birth to this nation are gone, the very documents that grant us freedom are under attack daily by proponents from both sides of government.

QFT.  As far as I can tell, only the libertarians really care that much about the constitution as intended these days and no one votes for them.  BTW good post.

Quote - The idea that wanting to clean out your government and change how it operates being "Anti-American" or committing treason  has to stop. The people in D.C. commit treason on a daily basis and this is acceptable???? If you say you love your country wouldn't you want to fight for it?

Treason was a crime invented by winners as an excuse for hanging losers.  :p

I think there are people who would fight for it, but the question is how.  Do you go to court?  Do you try to raise a few million dollars and run for congress?  Do you get the states to conviene a consitutional convention?  Do you get everyone you can peacefully together to march on washington and camp out at the mall until the government takes notice? 

To be honest, I don't think the current federal goverment is working.  I think it needs a more limited or at least a more well defined role and better people running it.  I mean why did the federal reserve let one bank go bankrupt one day and bail out another the next?  There's no rhyme or reason to it.  Why was the bail out filled with pork?  If it was so necessary, the people in congress should have voted for it as is.  Are we going to remain a capitalist economy, become socialist, or hover somewhere in between?  This needs to be spelled out and not done ad hoc by one manufactured crisis or another.  Plus there are a number of other issues aside from the economy that a lot of people are not happy with how they are settled, yet no progress can be made.

Synpainter, I like the quotes.

Sean, I've heard some people on the radio (not coast to coast AM either) saying that the end of the world is around the corner.  I guess the economy takes out america and the middle east decorates with a few mushroom clouds.  Comparitively speaking, WWIII doesn't sound so bad.

Kuroyume, I don't care who holds the wealth just so long as they earn it honestly.  If one guy makes 10 billion dollars without cheating anyone, good for him.  Another thing is that in the US, the poverty level is nearly 10K a year, so even someone who is just at that level is still relatively well off compared to places in africa and asia.

Xenophonz, I'm agreeing with you more than a bit.  Keep up the posting, it's saving me work.

  ;)

wolf, while I personally think that any sort of orchistrated government takeover is conspiracy theory bunk, after reading Goldberg's book, I think that the fascist elements in the US government (using Goldberg's definition) are quiet happy to use this as an excuse to usurp power.  In true capitalism, you'd have to let everything fail so people would learn from the failures and make sure not to repeat them.  Companies who made bad decisions and can't recover would be purged, and the more sound companies would remain.  Plus all those lost jobs would be absorbed into the better companies or new companies in the long run.  However in our semi-socialist state our government is jumping in when it shouldn't and I really don't think they can do any better.  I'll admit capitalism is very painful when there isn't charity, but if left alone it should work not too much unlike nature.  But if I recall what I heard about Smith's original intentions about capitalism, the goal was to create wealth and then the philanthropists would voluntarialy pass on that wealth to those in need. 

WARK!

Thus Spoketh Winterclaw: a blog about a Winterclaw who speaks from time to time.

 

(using Poser Pro 2014 SR3, on 64 bit Win 7, poser units are inches.)