AIG, BoA, UBS, WFG, GE, the Bush (1 and 2) administrations, Congress (both Houses), FDIC -- pretty much doesn’t matter where you look, the fault is easy to find if you are not part of the Washington insiders.
Republicans seem to make some good points about how to stimulate the economy in both good times and bad. They always make these points - ‘when the economy is running well, more goods are sold, business is booming, so we should take the “Wal-Mart approach” and lower taxes because it will reward people for doing well, and revenues will increase because of more goods are sold’. And when the economy is doing poorly, ‘we need to lower taxes so people will have more in their pockets, which they will spend in order to help the economy’.
Sounds great, right? Lower taxes, no matter what the economic situation.
Democrats seem to make some good points too. ‘We, as an advanced and prosperous society, should help people - they should have healthcare, good roads, every drug paid for or assistance to pay, etc.’
Sounds good, right? We are the “best nation on the planet” and so our citizens should have more benefits than any other nation on earth.
But there is another side to all this. To get the companies to have the freedom to expand and develop new things, Republicans act like Democrats -- ‘give them anything they want, lower barriers, remove oversight, de-regulate, ignore laws and common sense’. YES - they ignored LAWS. [Is that a treasonable offense?]
There is regulation to keep companies from running Ponzie schemes. The SEC, FDIC, and other sections of “our government” have long been assigned the task of watching over companies, examining books to look for “irregularities” and outright fraud. However, as shown recently with the Madoff rip-off, and several others, even when presented with evidence compiled by a non-government worker, the SEC refused to properly go over the books. As has been testified before Congress, some under-paid under-qualified junior auditor went in and checked some recent books and concluded nothing was wrong. When brought up again, no one was sent.
And as for “common sense” - anyone with a 50’s or 60’s high school education [our poor schools, and how / why they are so bad, are another article] knows that you can’t spend more than you make for more than a few months [and even then it is because of an emergency, not ‘we need a new couch’] and survive. Anyone [at least an honest person] with a lick of sense KNOWS that if you remove regulation, people will use GREED as their ‘moral compass’, and will do anything to make a buck.
How should Congress people / Government employees have known this? Because it is how they are living their lives right now. Just look at the recent Obama selections for high government posts. Over 50% have not paid the taxes they knew were due. You and I do that and the IRS will freeze our accounts until they make it impossible for us to pay, then they seize everything and force us into bankruptcy. But “Government Officials” are awarded high positions, and simply pay for the past with what they were supposed to pay anyway. What other evidence is there? How about Randy Cunningham of CA taking bribes, Or that Alaska member who had “friends” totally re-build his house, then claim “I thought my wife wrote them a check” [what a crock of shit].
Further - Man is not a “grazer”, taking only what he finds, moving on so as to not damage the landscape (as cattle unwittingly do) so severely that it can’t recover. Man is a “predator”, hunting, chasing, destroying, to “fill his belly”. When presented with some lax rules, he will hunt through them to find loopholes, bending and breaking rules, to claw his way on top of everyone else!
SO, what have we got? Two parties that don’t think you will ever have the gumption to stand up to them and remove them from office, because they keep “giving” us what we really want, something for nothing!
Republicans claim things will be paid for with “inflated dollars” - a $100 bill today is worth $75 dollars in a few years, so if we pay that bill, on paper 100=100, but it really hurt us less. But it never does happen, because they bump up spending, the economy doesn’t produce as much as their rosy picture, and debt increases. Then they lower tax rates again to “spur the economy”.
Democrats put in policies to raise taxes, lower taxes, and give you plenty of unpaid for services. They aren’t as quick to say that inflated dollars will fix everything, but do say that a healthier America will reduce costs.
What we need are a set of laws and rules, “set in stone”, that tell companies that they MUST follow standard accounting rules; “good will accounting” for purchases can not add more than ‘some reasonable percent’ [should be enforceable by Board of Directors’] or it will trigger a lower rating; criminal law should rule when company officials ruin a business, because they will have committed a fraud against shareholders and employees; the “rating agencies” should set realistic ratings [anything not above ‘A’ is considered bad? You start adding “A’s” and it just confuses the issue] and be accountable under law that they have actually checked the company, CDS, or whatever; the SPE [like in Enron} can not be used to foster off debt, because assigning debt to a company that can simply file for bankruptcy hides the real cost, and cost taxpayers plenty; and on and on.
And finally, there should be no more “forget about going after the ones that did this, and focus on fixing it”. First, you usually leave in place the ones that committed the ‘crime’, and you keep paying high salaries, rewarding them for ruining the business [staying in their federal job, etc]. Second, by not going after them even if removed, you are still telling them that there are no consequences to bad actions [reminder - a dog will eat the steak from the table unless taught not to; we are animals & will take what we can]. Tell me, if someone slaps you, do you say “forget it, I will try to duck next time”; a purse is stolen, you say “I’ll stop the credit cards & hold tighter next time”; will you “turn the other cheek” when someone kills your family? NO - you have them prosecuted. Same should be done to these thieves. {Gee - I just finished typing this, and Rep. Barney Frank just said on TV that we should go after them!}
SENT TO:
Washington Post 3/5/09 as Op-Ed, but not accepted, so it is MINE to do as I please
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