re: ["What? No more words about the Big Three?"]
I don't believe it's a question of whether they bailed out, only...
-- how much they get?
-- when they get it?
-- and with what restrictions?
We had the same rhetoric over government/deficit spending
during Regan's economic turnaround.
I don't have a "personal" dog in this fight, and it's an
endless debate with no easy, or perfect solution...
I could easily argue with passion - both sides of this
argument. But, given that "time" is not an option, I
side with a bailout, but one with strong restrictions,
and concessions.
Sadly, we're faced with the same choice we had in this year's
Presidential election -- no real solution, only the lesser
of two evils.
I don't know about you, but I'm getting damn tired of finding
myself, and our country, in the position of continually
having to choice between the lesser of two evils as
our only solutions.
But, like they say...
There are very few atheists found in foxholes, and I think
there will be very few libertarian, lasse faire capitalists
found in this market, before all is well and done.
I find it amusing to hear people talk about how the UAW
contracts should be beaten down to levels competitive with
auto workers in Spain, or Mexico...
Funny how the same argument isn't applied to Police Officers
who make $3 a day in third world countries, or Doctor's who
average about $40k a year in France's nationalized health
care system, or Systems Administrators who make $14k a year
in India, or Teachers who produce vastly superior results
in China and India for pennies on the dollars of what
US Teachers make etc.
I guess it really depends on whose Ox (or, job) is being gored,
now doesn't it <vbg>?
Let's just cut to the chase...
Ever since NAFTA and the move toward globalization, American
jobs and income have been pressured downward, and third world
jobs and income has surged upward.
It was inevitable. And it's only just begun.
Empires rise and empires fall.
The rich become too rich, less innovative, and acquire
structures that can not compete with emerging markets.
The problems will get much worse over time for America,
not better.
Our educational system, our culture, and the structure
of the American way of life will not allow us on whole,
to compete in a global job and wage arbitrage.
We have entire socio-economic groups of people who
can not compete, let alone even hold jobs in this
modern economy.
Tens upon tens of millions who are basically unemployable.
There are only so many greeters at WalMart, and only
so many cooks at McDonald's.
Say hello to the Welfare State.
Sure, some companies will prosper, but entire industries won't.
The globalists love this...
80% of Americans, in time, will beg for socialism,
15% will think they're still in the upper-middle,
or lower-upper class, and only 5% will break through
the barriers to the either the intellectual (political),
or economic elite that will be able to survive and prosper.
Bill Bonner's book -- "Empire of Debt" is the single most
accurate review of history and road map to America's future
that anyone can read.
It's all inevitable... it won't be pretty, and America
will ultimately be sucked down the vortex that the globalist
elitists have created and there is no stopping it from
happening.
It's only a matter of the rate of change, and whether they
can they do it without riots in the streets, and new
demagogues arising?
Until we collapse in a great(er) depression, no politician
will have the courage to tell Americans the truth, and
what sacrifices and improvements we must make as a people
to survive, let alone to prosper.
And even if an emerging leader did... I doubt as a people
if we'd have the foresight, the courage, or the willingness
to make the huge near term sacrifices in that present
generation, that would provide for the future of the
coming generations.
We are not the America of our forefathers, look at how far
we've drifted from the Constitution.
We're not even the America of our grandfathers, those of the
WWII era.
Our culture has changed.
Our expectations have changed.
We are a fat, lazy, overly prosperous, spendthrift society.
Our immigrant forefathers came to this country and lived
2 to 3 families to a home. They pooled money to survive.
They worked 2 and even 3 jobs if necessary. They wheeled
apple carts, they swept factory floors, and they dug coal
out of mines deep and dark below the earth. And above all,
they made sure their children got an education. One that
would ensure that they would have a better life.
That culture still lives... but, not part of indigenous
American culture, but only among newly arrived immigrants
in much smaller numbers than we had in the early 19th century.
But, that culture is alive in the third world, and now
an aging, lazy, and over-expectant America must compete
with that culture.
...and obviously it will not, and can not.
The writing is on the wall.
The biggest hurdle is the welfare state mentality among
large percentages of entire cultural blocks in this
country.
How will they ever compete with the workers that China
and India, and even what Eastern Europe's educational systems
are producing vs. the average US high school grad?
...let alone the problem with the HS graduation rate,
and literacy rate itself.
America needs HUGE changes in our educational system,
and in our culture to compete... and no one is willing
to either tell America the truth, or to institute those
changes.
And until someone does... as much as it pains me to say it,
America will continue on a rapidly declining slope.
It's only a matter of how fast, and how far we fall.
The only thing we are addressing presently, is the
rate of change.
SOTB |
