I have spent the better part of a month not blogging. Mainly, I have boycotted writing because the global warming goofballs are realizing that people don't want to hear about how bad they are treating the earth when they are constantly hearing about how far in the toilet the economy has gone. Also, I almost had a coronary the last time I looked at the 401k balance [NOTE TO SELF: Don't go to www.401k.com again for a while].
However, I have been thinking about why we are having a "crisis" on Wall Street. In my mind, it boils down to one thing: The government started messing with the free market. I think this conclusion is legitimate when I ponder the following:
- The Community Reinvestment Act -- This brillance passed by Congress during the Carter Administration required banks to make approximately 30% of their loans to people who probably weren't going to pay them back. That is truly dumb business, but banks "wrote it off" and continued to extend credit to each other.
- The Government Sponsored Entities (GSE's) -- Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The leaders of these two abominations used the organizations as their own personal piggy bank by taking tremendous risks while inflating their asset sheets. They were able to do this because they are sponsored by the government and didn't truly answer to anyone. That is, until the whole house of cards crumbled around them bringing the financial markets to a stand still.
- I watched Treasury Secretary Paulsen ask to become the czar of the entire U.S. financial system (no review by the judicial system or congressional oversight of any of the decisions of the Treasury Secretary's decisions in this "crisis"). This insulted everything associated with free markets and capitalism. I truly couldn't believe that this was a sincere proposal.
Finally, we are asked to believe that the same clowns that created the mess that we witnessed over the last few weeks will be able to fix the problem. So, I asked myself if I could say anything coherent about this mess. AND, the answer came back, "Not even close."
I truly can't wait for the election to be over. I am pretty much resigned to the fact that my taxes will go WAY up because the Dims will control the White House and both houses of Congress. I guess it's about fairness. Hopefully, they will be dumb enough to actually try to implement some of their proposals. If they do, I am pretty sure that we will get another 1994-style mid-term election.
In any case, I should probably do all my blogging between now and inauguration day. After that, I am not sure that we won't have a "Fairness Doctrine" for talk radio and a "Hate Speech Code" for the blogosphere.
Can anyone tell that I am a little bit depressed about the state of our nation?
