What about the “economy” on my street…
Posted on Sep 22, 2008 - 10:40pm by V. Grumpy in Trucking
I remember standing on the PATH train from NJ to what was the World Trade Center. Passengers had just learned that the desert helicopter rescue of the hostages in Iran had failed. There was dead silence, with the exception of a few newspaper pages turning. Passengers had this blank look on their faces. The last time I saw this look was when JFK was assassinated. That is until tonight.
I’m at the Cheers! truck stop in Charleston, MO. On the tv on one side of the restaurant is Bill O’Reilly. Over on the other side is Lou Dobbs on CNN speaking in the last five minutes of his show. Drivers, locals, RV’ers and others passing through are eating their dinner while listening to the news. Some looked up at the tv screens. Others didn’t care to. But for sure everyone had that look of shock, disappointment, disgust, anger, frustration and exhaustion. The same look as I saw back on that Path train.
A few of the folks actually shook their heads when Barney Frank and Sue Palosi talked about the “bailout” plan being negotiated. One man, after finishing his meal, stood up and didn’t move until a commercial came on. He almost looked like he had tears in his eyes. If not for the waitresses, who were quite upbeat, the atmosphere was quite depressing.
Today, the politicians debated the details of spending upwards of $1 trillion dollars of taxpayer money to bailout credit and mortgage institutions both here and abroad. Yes, I said abroad. It seems we now have to rescue some folks over in Europe as well. This will be added to our already bloated debt of over $9 trillion dollars. The Secretary of the Treasury seems not to like the idea of limiting or eliminating the “golden parachutes” of millions of dollars to the executives who mismanaged these companies. And there is still not a word about the folks who have or will lose their homes and jobs due to this worsening recession.
Politicians who championed deregulation in the past, now want us to forget their previously staunch positions while they now hold up flags of “re” regulation. Many of you should remember that the telephone, trucking and airline industries were subject to “tight” government oversight. But then we were sold a phony bill of goods whereby deregulation would get us better service and lower rates. Have you flown anywhere lately? And what do you pay for cable service a month? And do we, as truckers, make any more than we did 10 years ago? What about our taxes, tolls and the condition of the roads we drive on?
What about the owner/operator that cannot secure a loan to purchase an APU? What are you paying to cover your family with decent health insurance? What about your parents whose “retirement” is turning into a nightmare? Rest assured, they tell us, Congress is working overtime to help “us.” And we still have the task of electing a new administration in 40 days. And the candidates are doing the ‘ole Texas shuffle trying to sell us on their spur of the moment “miracle” plans to save us. If this wasn’t all so serious, it would have makings of a great Shakespearean play.
If you ever wanted to make a difference, now is time to voice your opinion. Call, write or e-mail your representatives. Ask them, “What about the economy on my street, Congressman?” Are you “As mad as hell, and not going to take it anymore?” Well do something about it. And stop staring out into space with that look on your face. I can’t take it anymore.
The photo credit is http://www.flickr.com/photos/11152879@N08/2091212063/
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This whole deal is worse than Enron and no one is going to jail? This is like using a band-aid for cancer. It’s only going to extend the inevitable till after the election.
I’m not sure what would happen if all those companies actually went bankrupt, but it will only get worse before it gets better. We need to hurry up and get through the worse instead of prolonging it.
The great depression lasted much longer than it should have because of all the government intervention in the economy.
I don’t think anyone really knows what to do, which means they probably shouldn’t be doing anything especially with our money.
It’s to the point that writing a congressman is a waste of time. It’s never worked as nothing has changed. It’s time for the American people to arrest these thieves of Americas wealth and try them for the criminals they are and have been. They all, Bush down to the execs of these brokerages need to be convicted of high crimes and treason ands be made destitute and turned out on the streets of America where the only freedom we have is the freedom to go dead flat broke and no one will care.
I dont pretend to be financially astute, but I smell a bad stench with this one-and the “quick, Congress, pass it before anybody complains!” act is really suspicious. So, I hunted up a Ron Paul interview on it and his take was this was exactly what they tried to do in the Depression-and thus caused the Depression to last ten years instead of just one. He says what they’re trying to do is keep prices elevated through this so none of the big-time investors lose too much. However, it will only drive inflation sky-high and the man on the street will be hurting bad. He said the elderly on Social Security will be unable to survive on what they get. As I know the prices of food and energy are already killing them/us, I cant imagine how they-and many others-will survive with higher prices.
Then, I looked to see what Joan Veon and Catherine Austin Fitts had to say-and they agreed with Paul. This makes it worse for us-and saves the skin of the bunch that created the problem. The general concensus was, the Fed created this monster and now, we’re turning it over to them to fix? The US no longer controls it’s financial systems-instead a private entity will have complete control of our economy! The whole mess smells like organised crime-and all of these financial people have been saying that’s what it was for years! It doesnt bode well for the guy with a nice nest egg in his 401(k) either way, but managing to save a bit of it if inflation makes it worthless doesnt help much either. The economy needs to level out and prices need to settle to their natural level.This prevents that from happening. Housing prices NEED to take the big dump-I have one next to me that the price has inflated from $160,000 to $250,000 in five years-and it wasnt really worth the $160,000.
Maybe its time to call a few congressmen-we’re being given the old fast sale on this. I’d rather deal with one bad year than ten or more.