Gubmint Bailouts

I don't think I am smart enough to figure out a way out of the current economic morass. Apparently a lot of other people aren't smart enough either, since it happened and there are supposed to be a whole lot of smart people making sure these things don't happen.

Well, another thing, a large percentage of people are not as smart as they think they are. Not everybody scored in the 90th percentile on their standardized testing. That's why it's the 90th percentile. If you scored that high, you probably went to Harvard, or Yale, or some other fine institution which grooms the financial leaders of tomorrow. People in the lower percentiles who are good looking go into television media, the ones who have a face for radio do their thing, and the rest of us blog. There's just not enough smart people to go around. It's not the Media's fault...how could you explain Calculus to a four year old when you yourself couldn't grasp fractions?

In fact, maybe there are people smart enough out there, but they have been too busy making money. So busy in fact that they couldn't pause long enough to realize that what they were doing would lead to economic collapse. Or maybe they were really smart and figured out that all of the other people who went to Harvard and Yale but had family money and went into Politics would write a $700 Billion government check. The first group, the money-makers, looked at all the risks and contingencies. In fact, they analyzed, they ruminated, they ran what-if scenarios, and ultimately, they knew their classmates would write that check.

What about holding indivduals accountable for their actions? I am not talking about criminally liable, I am talking about financially liable. I am talking about all those too stupid or too bold or both to realize that they stuck themselves in a place they shouldn't be. Why should we, the taxpayer, subsidize stupidity of people who borrowed more than they could ever repay? Why not let it collapse, re-value, go through a market-correction, and let some good old fashioned natural selection financially trim some of the fat.

Pretty hard & cold I know. But what happens after you spend the $700 Billion to bail out the homeowners, the financiers, the insurance companies, the credit card holders and the rest of the motley crew? Has any learning taken place?

Yes there has been some learning. They learned that it doesn't matter what I do, Uncle Sam will take care of me. And so they'll charge ahead, literally, leveraging everything again, and create a bigger fiasco than before. Meanwhile, the government will slap so much regulation on Wall Street that it will be impossible for you and I to ever realize any kind of return out of the market.

I don't think you can fight it...there are too many stupid people and too many willing to subsidize the stupidity and hamper the capitalist engine along the way. So, I just want to know, where do I line up and where do I sign to turn over my mortgage and my credit card debt to the government so I can start over too.