I have some ideas about the economy....

Ok, so I've heard a substantial amount of criticism about the bail out plan. I'm actually tired of hearing all the bitching and political nonsense around this problem. It was inevitable, something anyone that could read recognized more than two years ago and needs some dynamic thinking to get fixed. So here are some ideas to get us on the mend:

What if we stopped spending hundreds of millions in Iraq this week by recalling our troops?

Why don't we cut the military's budget by at least 40% immediately and mandate that a certain % of the existing budget be focused on the veterans (has to be a whole number above 10%).

By the way, I think weapons and heavy military spending are a waste of cash and we seem to be out of it as is. Who are we kidding? The military needs to be a little smarter about how we spend our $$$. The war and our military spending reminds me of someone sitting with a max'ed out credit card buying stuff on HSN at 2 am in the morning. We can't afford anymore cheap cubic zirconia weapons of mass destruction yet we seem to keep buying them as the clock goes down and our interest rates go up.

Let's go on:

Why can't we convene a special investigators office out of the GAO and the Treasury to audit (yes, audit) the records and information from the top Wall Street offenders? At the end of the audit, we'd have a complete idea of what was spent, where and what is owed (and to whom).

Why are we in such a hurry for a quick fix? I've seen no proof that this problem can be fixed by spending our way out of it? If you fail to plan, you plan to fail. Why can't we, meaning our government, look at this a bit more like a long term infrastructure project:

1. Map out the problem. Do an audit of the system as well as of the offending companies.
2. Weed out the offending companies and put an immediate stop to bad trade practices.
3. Map out the business problems and come up with proposed ideas or solutions.
4. We have some of the brightest minds in the world, why can't we convene a panel from our top schools, top business leaders and ordinary people that stand nothing to gain from a multinational bank or financial institution?
5. Maybe we can ask some people that aren't total screw ups like the Swiss? Maybe there are people in this world that are doing things differently and looking at the same problems different ways.
6. We should set a real time frame to solve these issues. Let's face it, this is borne out of American's addiction to getting things without having the money to pay for them. So set a timeframe out for a fix and live with some pain and hassle for a while. Not everything is easy.
7. At the end of the project the American people should have an infrastructure to better support our finances and way of life. Kind of like our roads, sewer, water and power grid. They aren't perfect but they are vastly more predictable.
8. One more thing, we need to put in place laws and regulations that penalize people and companies that take advantage of our free market. Some of the millionaire motherfuckers that outright stole from the most needy in our society (such as senior citizens and those that can't help themselves living below the poverty level) need to get ass raped in prison, repeatedly.
9. How about we spend a minute or two looking back on history and considering past solutions to current problems. We seem to not give a shit about history in this country. We had this thing called "The Great Depression". Ponzi schemes and scumbag financiers put us there. How did we get out of it? We've had several crisis in this country before this one and I don't seem to remember anyone chucking $700 billion on the fire and hoping that everything gets better. That kind of reasoning hasn't worked so well for our country for the last 8 years.
   

Ok, anger aside, our representatives can no longer blow George Bush and his minions ad nauseam. Democrats, you can be replaced as well. This isn't rocket science here folks. Thousands of years of great thinkers and civilizations have risen and fallen before us. One thing to consider though: while we screw up the rest of the world is learning from our mistakes at lightspeed. While we march around with collective head up our nationalistic asses waving the flag and jabbering on about how America is free and the greatest country in the world, our enemies and allies alike are putting controls in place to keep the flailing, spastic Americans from tanking their economies again. If you think we look silly now wait until the rest of the world puts up its' collective nose at us and tells us to come back when we learn to be civilized.

I have some experience climbing out of holes and I can tell you it is much harder to climb out of a deep hole by yourself. And when you aren't a millionaire and you have a kitchen table full of unpayable bills, the world can feel pretty damn lonely.

Seems like right now we're acting like children minus parental supervision. We need to do better than this.

Marc

PS I am a huge fan of Dave Ramsey. Remember what Dave says: The borrower is a slave to the lender. We need to stop being borrowers to start a road to recovery.