Surely We Ain’t That Stupid, Are We Shirley?

How much is $700 billion? It comes to $4,780 for every taxpayer in the U.S. What was the last thing you bought for $4,780? The last thing you bought and didn't get to take home?

There is one reason for this and one reason only (oh, if only the rest of life could be as uncomplicated!). Greed. Period. Greed on the part of Wall Street. And simple laziness on the part of Washington. It is so sadly familiar, isn't it?

Is there some particular reason we should bail out companies that have been acting outside of banking rules and regs just so they can make huge profits (or not)? They paid their dues and they took their chances. Now, when Republicans say that government should be out of our lives (everywhere except the bedroom, that is), Treasury Secretary Paulson wants to have $700 billion to play with all by himself. Gosh, wouldn't that be fun? Just think of the fun you could have with this kind of monopoly money! No questions asked, no nada, just do what you will with the money. And this is a man who was chairman and CEO of investment banking at Goldman Sachs--the very company that Warren Buffet is putting up money for. Why would he do that? Why would this one man put up $5 billion dollars of his own money for the company that the Treasury Secretary used to run? The company that is going down the tubes with the rest of the greedy guts who took a chance, made tons o' money, and now that the money has stopped coming in because of the crappy economy, they're all bailing out. Huh? Is this how you would run a business?

I'm no expert, that's for sure, but I'm wondering what would really happen if we just let these guys go down the tubes. And I mean flushed away like the shit they are. Everyone who is fortunate to have a mortgage financed by these companies just gets to keep their houses free of charge. Nobody to write a monthly check to, anymore. No more paperwork. All gone. Oh, sure, investors would get bitten, but let's define investors--folks who have extra money every month after they pay their bills, right?

Everybody knows that investments have some degree of risk, isn't that right? So, under the above-mentioned plan, investors lose money, commensurate with what they had to invest, and the rest of us lose nada, commensurate with what we had to invest. Doesn't that seem fair?

And if Warren Buffet wants to keep Paulson's company alive so Paulson has a place to play a few months from now, why not? Let the rest of them take the billions they've already made and go ruin some other companies! And leave us with $4,780 in our pocket that we earned the hard way.

The Republicans just gave us a whole bunch of money back, right? How many folks got $4,780? Anyone? Anyone? Now, they want it all back, plus quite a bit more. There are guys in Portland, OR who are saying that this is the "October Surprise", i.e., the thing that the Bush administration will do to keep Republicans (if not Dick and George) in office. I think we have even juicier things to look forward to, but let's please not buy this crap. Make 'em take down a few more tall buildings, okay?