To the editor:
Every economic disaster is the result of poor government policies. The current recession is no exception. Ten years ago, President Clinton and Congress were rejoicing because they had successfully repealed the Glass-Steagall Act. The result of this repeal was nothing more than a subsidy for the rich at the expense of the middle class.
Wall Street investment banks gambled with taxpayer dollars without impunity. Wall Street successfully bought off Congress with a few million dollars worth of campaign contributions. An incompetent Congress returned the favor by bailing out Wall Street with billions of taxpayer dollars. Wall Street wins, incumbents remain in office, and present and future generations are left with a national debt approaching $12 trillion. In my opinion, this is nothing less than treason.
The current administration has done nothing to reverse the situation. They have, in fact, accelerated the problem. During the past year, the largest Wall Street banks have become larger and pose an even greater risk to the economy.
The next election will allow independent voters the opportunity to form a court of common sense. Common sense implies that we elect leaders rather than career politicians. No more incumbents. There will be no such thing as “too big to fail.” Bailouts will not be in our vocabulary. Elected and appointed officials that make policy decisions based on personal self-interest rather than for the good of the country will serve their next term in prison.
Comments
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merrill (anonymous) says…
There is no evidence that candidates from the business community make the best politicians. They are much too eager to give our tax dollars away to the business community without solid foundation as to why. Speculation is not a solid foundation.
There is no solid evidence that tax cuts produce tons of jobs. If tax cuts/tax incentives produced tons of jobs the USA and Lawrence would be standing in the sea of job surplus.
http://www.dollarsandsense.org/archiv...
If business people make the best candidates why did Lawrence,Kansas become a “boom town economy? Boom town economies always crash this is not new economics. Why is Lawrence always broke? Why? There are way too many “free lunch programs” .
http://www.democracynow.org/2008/1/18...
merrill (anonymous) says…
The letter writer provides much food for thought which for the most part is a good letter. Always remember no president has faced what Obama walked into. The USA needs to stop the war and direct that spending towards new industry and jobs jobs jobs.
More reckless spenders anywhere in government is a recipe for economic disaster. Look at Lawrence, state of Kansas and Washington D.C. Reckless spenders ignore education as a driver for a strong economy. Education remains strong no matter what the economy may be experiencing.
Millions of jobs were lost during the FIRST Savings and Loan/home loan scandal and during the global economy push = outsourcing under Reagan-Bush. Yes republicans gave outsourcing a wide open door as they began waving good bye to the best paying USA jobs. Yes the global economy and free trade began their road to failure.
Then Bush/Quale came along = no new industry and no new jobs.
Then free trade NAFTA came along = more USA jobs down the hatch
Bush/Cheney lost 2 million in their first admin and 6 million during the second admin when the SECOND home/loan scandal surfaced still no new industry and no new jobs.
The USA is down about 20 million jobs. No new industry has been been developed to bring those jobs and their pay scales back = loss of national wealth. No country,state or city can afford companies that send jobs abroad. It’s called Wreckanomics.
Liberty_One (anonymous) says…
"The result of this repeal was nothing more than a subsidy for the rich at the expense of the middle class."
Incorrect. First of all it was only a partial repeal. The FDIC part was not repealed--thus contributing to the financial crisis. In addition, the subsidy to the rich was not the repeal but the subsequent bailout. Repealing a regulation preventing mergers is purely structural. The LTE hopes the readers are too ignorant to know what the actual law was about.
The problem is regulations like the FDIC. When you deposit your money in a bank, do you even care about how risky that bank is? No, of course not, your money is guaranteed by the FDIC. Depositors have no incentive whatsoever to only do business with banks that don't take risks. They have every incentive to do business with banks that take lots of risks because the riskier they are the higher the returns they can offer.
In addition the Federal Reserve causes banks to be riskier. If there was no Fed to act as the lender of last resort, banks would have to be much more careful in their actions in order to avoid bank runs and overextending themselves. Regulation and government intervention encourage risky behavior.
jayhawklawrence (anonymous) says…
Merrill
"There is no evidence that candidates from the business community make the best politicians. They are much too eager to give our tax dollars away to the business community without solid foundation as to why. Speculation is not a solid foundation."
Sounds like an accountant's point of view and not a businessman.
On the flip side, politicians with no experience in the business community are too eager to tax businesses out of business and don't understand the principle that you cannot make profits without risk unless all you do is tax.
Why do manufacturers feel overburdened and scared to invest? Because for decades they have been appealing to people in government who don't have any sympathy for their plight because they are..well...stupid.
This group includes Democrats AND Republicans.
We need a better job of helping manufacturers rather than appointing a union lawyer as the manufacturing czar and playing patty cake with the Chinese government.
jayhawklawrence (anonymous) says…
Right now, the only thing that is apparent to the American people is that the Republicans AND the Democrats are spending nearly all of our money bailing out financial institutions. The bailout of FORD and GM is essentially looking like a bail out of the unions at this point.
Nothing else has changed. The big money still owns our big fat leaders in Congress.
leedavid (anonymous) says…
Merrill goes off on his daily it was Booooossssshhhhh's fault. Failing to note that since the democrats took over congress, more than twice as many jobs have been lost than under the Booooossssshhhhh republican congress. Then of course there were the jobs lost under Clinton that went to China to consider.
Meanwhile, back in the real world, our government (republican and democrat) have spent billions we don't have for things we don't need and have not done one thing to put Americans back to work. Now there isn't any money out there to create jobs. I think we should focus on our situation and not so much on blame games.
jayhawklawrence (anonymous) says…
My apologies to Alan Mulally for mentioned FORD as a bail out company.
I was in a hurry to get somewhere by 8:00am and had my fingers on auto pilot.
In fact, I am shopping for an Escape. A black Limited is my first choice.
svenway_park (anonymous) says…
Of course Cool/Spiderman/Bronze/Ariadne/rusty2/dried_oregano/2bfrank doesn't ever like *any* city or county commissioner, and rants on them regularly here, as he has done in every city in which he has lived.
Because he is smarter than everyone else. Just like Merrill. Just ask them.
jayhawklawrence (anonymous) says…
I would like a hybrid. I was worried about them at first but might check that out.
I need to pull a boat too so that might be a problem.
snap_pop_no_crackle (anonymous) says…
Relax & have a popsicle, frank. It's a cool and fruity treat on an autumn day.
jayhawklawrence (anonymous) says…
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smot (anonymous) says…
I have not voted for an incumbent of either party for over twenty years. Elected positions should not be professional positions or lifetime in nature. Voting is relatively east for me....no incumbents and no lawyers.
vertigo (Jesse Crittenden) says…
Liberty_One says...
In addition the Federal Reserve causes banks to be riskier. If there was no Fed to act as the lender of last resort, banks would have to be much more careful in their actions in order to avoid bank runs and overextending themselves. Regulation and government intervention encourage risky behavior.
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Apparently someone never heard of the Great Depression. You know... the banks back then didn't have the government intervention, how'd that turn out for us? How do you explain their collapse? The lack of the FDIC didn't stop those banks from taking risks, did it?
I guess you look forward to more bank runs? A bank run occurs when a large number of bank customers withdraw their deposits because they believe the bank is, or might become, insolvent. As a bank run progresses, it generates its own momentum, in a kind of self-fulfilling prophecy: as more people withdraw their deposits, the likelihood of default increases, and this encourages further withdrawals. Which, of course, lengthens the recession, or worse turns it into a depression.